“Would like some more tea?”
Maki had no idea, but those words instilled him with dread. Hopelessness. Futility. A flash of her face. The sweet embrace of pain followed.
“Would like some more tea?”
Maki was scared. Maki was alone. He fights back. He fails. And he watches as this woman, who was so familiar but he could not place, kills Takeshi right before him, then casually removes one of his limbs and forces hellfire into his skull.
“Would like some more tea?”
Maki was in a padded room. She was there. He could not stop her from beheading his wife. He could not stop her from torturing him. He was useless. He was a failure. He was nothing.
“Would like some more tea?”
Void. Emptiness. Maki was a shell. He was no shinobi. He was nothing more than a man who failed. A man who let down all of those who depended upon him. He had cost those he loved most dearly with his failure. He had let Konoha down, and he could not place how.
“Would you please stop fucking around?”
Maki opens his eyes. He was in an office. Not his own, but one eerily similar. One wall was completely transparent, looking out over a large city setup in the lake of a caldera. Something about it called to part of him. His eyes move along the buildings he can see. The amusement park, the casino, then they fall to the large mansion that spread across two islands. How did he know this place? And why were they so high up that he could see all of this? See to the very ocean beyond the crater walls.
“I said, stop fucking around. You’re going to get us both killed.”
Maki turns around swiftly, taking in the person speaking to him. They were seated behind a desk, not a large one but quite obviously of the finest make without forcing itself to be gaudy. There were papers strewn about it, but there seemed to be an order to the chaos. As if someone wanted it to be hard to find anything while knowing where to look themselves. He looks up slightly to the man himself.
Long white hair surrounded a golden face. Sharp, angular features were looking back at him. But it was the eyes that drew one’s gaze. Golden irises around pupils dark as space and shaped like hourglasses. Eyes that could see what others could not. Maki knew this person. Had fought this person’s puppeteered corpse before. A guttural growl begins in his chest.
“Though, I suppose I am already dead. Nevertheless, I do not want my spirit to be destroyed by your foolishness. Oh do stop the theatrics and sit down, brother of mine. We have much to discuss, and unless you want to spend the rest of eternity discussing it we don’t have much time to do so.”
Maki reaches for his sword, but nothing seems to be happening. He looks down and sees only a stump ending just above his elbow. The world around him begins to dim, his vision tunneling on that sight before a flying book slaps into him and draws his attention, and ire, at the person who threw it.
“Sit. I’m not here to fight you. It wouldn’t do either of us any good if I did.” The form motions to a chair, and Maki looks around, before using his foot to shove it aside. ”I’m sitting.” Golden eyes narrow a bit before the other sighs. “Indeed. Moving on then. Do you know who I am?” The question wasn’t one Maki expected. Of course he knew this man. It was the thief of his soul. The firstborn of the clan that their parents sacrificed Maki himself to in order to bolster the other’s failing health.
”Yeah. You’re an uptight asshole with a god complex and an ego so vast that the sun sometimes shines green with envy. You’re the man who uprooted an entire clan because he got his feelings hurt. Who sacrificed his parents to his own power in order to try and attain godhood. The man who took my damned soul and tainted it. I know you.”
“Good.” Hoshikata motions slightly, and the chair slides up behind Maki and smacks into the back of his shins, bringing him into a sitting position. “Then you know that currently, I’m dead. So attacking me won’t do anything. What you don’t know, is that your soul is being split in two. Yes yes yes, you took it back from Osore and had a horrible night when you did. All well and good, except you’ve been trying ever since to force your control upon it.”
“And I’ve been fighting back, tooth and nail, from within you. Because, you see, I am destined for greatness, and I will not be subsumed by someone who thinks the greatest moment of his life was when he was a mute simpleton. But neither of us can afford this fight any longer. You’re currently severely wounded, not only physically. Your mind is unravelling.”
”Sounds like a load of shit from someone who knows his end is near and he’s doing all he can to keep it from happening. Release me from whatever genjutsu this is so I can go about my day.”
“Would you like some more tea?”
As Hoshikata speaks, Maki doubles over and gives a groan of pain. Feelings rush in. Pain, loss, depression, emptiness. He was nothing. He was useless. He was a failure. How dare he assume he was any good to anyone when all he could do was put those he loved in danger? He was the worst thing to ever happen to his friends. He was a fool who couldn’t stand up in a fight.
“Do you think that is a genjutsu? You know genjutsu, Maki. You know that, right there, is not one. What it is, is a wound. You talk of my ego being vast, but your own is quite large as well. And the beating you took at the hands of that woman has left it shattered. The attacks on your mind has left it with a gaping wound. And you, well, you’re currently on the brink of complete mental collapse. And when that happens, you will not be coming back.”
Maki looks up, his face streaked with the wet remnants of the emotions that had gripped him so fiercely. ”And what do you care…?” Maki’s voice was weak, but tinged with the rage of knowing someone could reduce him to a blubbering fool with a mere question. ”Wouldn’t it be on your best interest if my mind dies? You can go back to controlling things.”
“Are you so foolish? I have no control over your body. If I did, I’d have used it by now. I do have some control externally, but so far I’ve only used it to save your sorry ass once. And then you tried to weaponize it without even taking the time to understand what it was! That’s why it cost you the second round in the tournament. You didn’t take the time to figure out what this toy you had could do or what the downsides were. And there are ALWAYS downsides.”
Maki sits back, letting the words of Hoshikata sink in. His soul was splitting, and Hoshikata just admitted to controlling the persona he’d come to rely on so much these past years. With questioning look, he brings forth his conclusion. ”So the persona is the split part of my soul? I’ve been splitting my own soul in half each time I use it in a fight?”
“Yes. Very good, you get a gold star. And that’s why it is both a strength and a weakness. It can attack from beyond the veil of life and death, which gives awesome power to those who use it. But attacks aimed at it that are off a less….permanent nature tend to have an intense backlash into your own soul. You’re opening yourself up each and every time you use it.”
”But you said you used it to save me….?”
“Don’t! Don’t think about it. Your mind can’t handle it right now. Just try to relax and think about something else. We need to keep you alive, or we both perish. What you need to do is stay right there in that seat while this all gets better.”
Something about those words struck him as odd. Maki’s head tilts ever so slightly. Something was not right here. Well, honestly, nothing was right here but something was very not right. The samurai slayer rises from his seat, kicking it away from him as he does. He might not know what was going on, but Maki had some very deep seated instincts for how to handle it when things were off.
”You think me that weak? Of course. You’re me. Drop the façade. Hoshikata is not only dead, his spirit is gone. You’re just another hallucination dreamed up by my brain to try and keep me from getting hurt. Unfortunately, I don’t have time for that.” He reaches for his sword, noting with clarity that one of his arms was gone. As he frees the blade, one of his eyes simply stops registering. He knew where it had gone, also.
The form before him sighs, before rising and rising and rising. Soon it stood before him, the armored figure that had protected him and sheltered him, fought for him and brought him glory. Words were no longer needed as Maki lets out a whistle, scattering the furniture. Before he can attack, however, the thing….shifts. A white mask covers the helmet briefly before fading. Maki lets forth another whistle, and nothing happens.
To say he was alarmed would be an understatement. Somehow this thing had ripped his gift from him. He stole it from the soul of Ha, and apparently the soul of Ha had taken it back. With a shout, then, Maki leaps at the figure, sword swinging wide to be knocked aside by a riposte that he barely evades. Sword rings on sword, his own seeming paltry beside the raw hunk of iron that his opponent had, but it worked.
Maki knew his persona was simply trying to protect him. And he knew that it didn’t lie earlier about what it was. His soul was split in two. And he would have to fix that. But he would not walk around with a weakness like that on his shoulders. The fight was short, but it was brutal. Finally, Maki ducks low as it overswings, and his own sword slams into the armor, all of his force behind the point before it punches through.
Maki shoves his hand into the hole left behind, gripping the substance of souls behind it. ”I may have split you off out of fear of what was happening to me, but I need your power now. And I will not have you weakening me. Come, let’s end this.” He pulls his arm free, the smoke dying as a pure white something comes out of the armor with him, envelopes him. Frees him.
“Would you like some more tea?”
The nurse screams as his remaining hand grabs her wrist, the nurse she’d been offering tea to also screams, running out of the room to fetch the mednin in charge of him.
”Shut up about the fucking tea.”
Maki had no idea, but those words instilled him with dread. Hopelessness. Futility. A flash of her face. The sweet embrace of pain followed.
“Would like some more tea?”
Maki was scared. Maki was alone. He fights back. He fails. And he watches as this woman, who was so familiar but he could not place, kills Takeshi right before him, then casually removes one of his limbs and forces hellfire into his skull.
“Would like some more tea?”
Maki was in a padded room. She was there. He could not stop her from beheading his wife. He could not stop her from torturing him. He was useless. He was a failure. He was nothing.
“Would like some more tea?”
Void. Emptiness. Maki was a shell. He was no shinobi. He was nothing more than a man who failed. A man who let down all of those who depended upon him. He had cost those he loved most dearly with his failure. He had let Konoha down, and he could not place how.
“Would you please stop fucking around?”
Maki opens his eyes. He was in an office. Not his own, but one eerily similar. One wall was completely transparent, looking out over a large city setup in the lake of a caldera. Something about it called to part of him. His eyes move along the buildings he can see. The amusement park, the casino, then they fall to the large mansion that spread across two islands. How did he know this place? And why were they so high up that he could see all of this? See to the very ocean beyond the crater walls.
“I said, stop fucking around. You’re going to get us both killed.”
Maki turns around swiftly, taking in the person speaking to him. They were seated behind a desk, not a large one but quite obviously of the finest make without forcing itself to be gaudy. There were papers strewn about it, but there seemed to be an order to the chaos. As if someone wanted it to be hard to find anything while knowing where to look themselves. He looks up slightly to the man himself.
Long white hair surrounded a golden face. Sharp, angular features were looking back at him. But it was the eyes that drew one’s gaze. Golden irises around pupils dark as space and shaped like hourglasses. Eyes that could see what others could not. Maki knew this person. Had fought this person’s puppeteered corpse before. A guttural growl begins in his chest.
“Though, I suppose I am already dead. Nevertheless, I do not want my spirit to be destroyed by your foolishness. Oh do stop the theatrics and sit down, brother of mine. We have much to discuss, and unless you want to spend the rest of eternity discussing it we don’t have much time to do so.”
Maki reaches for his sword, but nothing seems to be happening. He looks down and sees only a stump ending just above his elbow. The world around him begins to dim, his vision tunneling on that sight before a flying book slaps into him and draws his attention, and ire, at the person who threw it.
“Sit. I’m not here to fight you. It wouldn’t do either of us any good if I did.” The form motions to a chair, and Maki looks around, before using his foot to shove it aside. ”I’m sitting.” Golden eyes narrow a bit before the other sighs. “Indeed. Moving on then. Do you know who I am?” The question wasn’t one Maki expected. Of course he knew this man. It was the thief of his soul. The firstborn of the clan that their parents sacrificed Maki himself to in order to bolster the other’s failing health.
”Yeah. You’re an uptight asshole with a god complex and an ego so vast that the sun sometimes shines green with envy. You’re the man who uprooted an entire clan because he got his feelings hurt. Who sacrificed his parents to his own power in order to try and attain godhood. The man who took my damned soul and tainted it. I know you.”
“Good.” Hoshikata motions slightly, and the chair slides up behind Maki and smacks into the back of his shins, bringing him into a sitting position. “Then you know that currently, I’m dead. So attacking me won’t do anything. What you don’t know, is that your soul is being split in two. Yes yes yes, you took it back from Osore and had a horrible night when you did. All well and good, except you’ve been trying ever since to force your control upon it.”
“And I’ve been fighting back, tooth and nail, from within you. Because, you see, I am destined for greatness, and I will not be subsumed by someone who thinks the greatest moment of his life was when he was a mute simpleton. But neither of us can afford this fight any longer. You’re currently severely wounded, not only physically. Your mind is unravelling.”
”Sounds like a load of shit from someone who knows his end is near and he’s doing all he can to keep it from happening. Release me from whatever genjutsu this is so I can go about my day.”
“Would you like some more tea?”
As Hoshikata speaks, Maki doubles over and gives a groan of pain. Feelings rush in. Pain, loss, depression, emptiness. He was nothing. He was useless. He was a failure. How dare he assume he was any good to anyone when all he could do was put those he loved in danger? He was the worst thing to ever happen to his friends. He was a fool who couldn’t stand up in a fight.
“Do you think that is a genjutsu? You know genjutsu, Maki. You know that, right there, is not one. What it is, is a wound. You talk of my ego being vast, but your own is quite large as well. And the beating you took at the hands of that woman has left it shattered. The attacks on your mind has left it with a gaping wound. And you, well, you’re currently on the brink of complete mental collapse. And when that happens, you will not be coming back.”
Maki looks up, his face streaked with the wet remnants of the emotions that had gripped him so fiercely. ”And what do you care…?” Maki’s voice was weak, but tinged with the rage of knowing someone could reduce him to a blubbering fool with a mere question. ”Wouldn’t it be on your best interest if my mind dies? You can go back to controlling things.”
“Are you so foolish? I have no control over your body. If I did, I’d have used it by now. I do have some control externally, but so far I’ve only used it to save your sorry ass once. And then you tried to weaponize it without even taking the time to understand what it was! That’s why it cost you the second round in the tournament. You didn’t take the time to figure out what this toy you had could do or what the downsides were. And there are ALWAYS downsides.”
Maki sits back, letting the words of Hoshikata sink in. His soul was splitting, and Hoshikata just admitted to controlling the persona he’d come to rely on so much these past years. With questioning look, he brings forth his conclusion. ”So the persona is the split part of my soul? I’ve been splitting my own soul in half each time I use it in a fight?”
“Yes. Very good, you get a gold star. And that’s why it is both a strength and a weakness. It can attack from beyond the veil of life and death, which gives awesome power to those who use it. But attacks aimed at it that are off a less….permanent nature tend to have an intense backlash into your own soul. You’re opening yourself up each and every time you use it.”
”But you said you used it to save me….?”
“Don’t! Don’t think about it. Your mind can’t handle it right now. Just try to relax and think about something else. We need to keep you alive, or we both perish. What you need to do is stay right there in that seat while this all gets better.”
Something about those words struck him as odd. Maki’s head tilts ever so slightly. Something was not right here. Well, honestly, nothing was right here but something was very not right. The samurai slayer rises from his seat, kicking it away from him as he does. He might not know what was going on, but Maki had some very deep seated instincts for how to handle it when things were off.
”You think me that weak? Of course. You’re me. Drop the façade. Hoshikata is not only dead, his spirit is gone. You’re just another hallucination dreamed up by my brain to try and keep me from getting hurt. Unfortunately, I don’t have time for that.” He reaches for his sword, noting with clarity that one of his arms was gone. As he frees the blade, one of his eyes simply stops registering. He knew where it had gone, also.
The form before him sighs, before rising and rising and rising. Soon it stood before him, the armored figure that had protected him and sheltered him, fought for him and brought him glory. Words were no longer needed as Maki lets out a whistle, scattering the furniture. Before he can attack, however, the thing….shifts. A white mask covers the helmet briefly before fading. Maki lets forth another whistle, and nothing happens.
To say he was alarmed would be an understatement. Somehow this thing had ripped his gift from him. He stole it from the soul of Ha, and apparently the soul of Ha had taken it back. With a shout, then, Maki leaps at the figure, sword swinging wide to be knocked aside by a riposte that he barely evades. Sword rings on sword, his own seeming paltry beside the raw hunk of iron that his opponent had, but it worked.
Maki knew his persona was simply trying to protect him. And he knew that it didn’t lie earlier about what it was. His soul was split in two. And he would have to fix that. But he would not walk around with a weakness like that on his shoulders. The fight was short, but it was brutal. Finally, Maki ducks low as it overswings, and his own sword slams into the armor, all of his force behind the point before it punches through.
Maki shoves his hand into the hole left behind, gripping the substance of souls behind it. ”I may have split you off out of fear of what was happening to me, but I need your power now. And I will not have you weakening me. Come, let’s end this.” He pulls his arm free, the smoke dying as a pure white something comes out of the armor with him, envelopes him. Frees him.
“Would you like some more tea?”
The nurse screams as his remaining hand grabs her wrist, the nurse she’d been offering tea to also screams, running out of the room to fetch the mednin in charge of him.
”Shut up about the fucking tea.”
