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pseudowho · 2 months

Text

Calamus et Gladius

(help me find the Higuruma artist in the banner, for crediting and thanks/permission!)

Stolen from a foreign army to participate in the Culling Game, speaking little to no Japanese with just a rifle for self-defence, the reader partakes in a bittersweet dance of death and love, with Higuruma Hiromi.

Warnings: 18+, MDNI, enemies to lovers, murder, use of firearms, the desperate smut of two traumatised people who fall hopelessly in love.

This is long, but I make no apologies, because the payoff is worth it.

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You were used to violence. You were used to senseless bloodshed. Used to rains of bullets, flinging shrapnel, your ears ringing with explosions and screams.

Yet, it was your own screams that rang through you, as an enormous gavel split the earth where you had just stood.

Your entire unit was dead, almost fifty men and women lured into Tokyo Colony One, and you scrabbled back on grazed hands, kicking feet, as this ink-haired monster stepped slowly through the rubble and gore, black eyes fixed on you with the rage and fervour of a justified killer.

He appeared to hesitate only briefly as your face crumpled up at him in tearful rage and despair, desperation. You did not move to grab the rifle on your back; a threat of retaliation would be your downfall.

Despite being the only one of your unit who had had something new, something alien awakened within them, you had developed no fantastical technique. You had no mystical weapon. You had no roiling blue flames engulfing your fists. You had only the ability to sense others like you, and the horrifying stop-motion beasts that now sullied your sight. It was enough, at least, to hide.

"Please-- please--" you begged, the last attempt of a cornered woman. Your back pressed against the wall, the wide street around you a no-man's land of rubble, overturned cars and bloody splatters. The man's hand tightened on his gavel, his other raising to swipe flicks of black fringe off his forehead. He frowned, stopping. You noticed his distinctive hooked nose, crinkling in disgust.

"English," he offered, thickly accented, neither a question or a statement. You gulped, nodding with urgency, any dialogue an opportunity to re-establish his humanity.

"Innocent," you insisted, hands raised in front of you, disarming, "I'm innocent." That word, the man seemed to recognise, and he blew air through his nose, snorting in mirth.

"Innocent?" He asked, sarcastic.

He knelt down in front of you, his eyes still offering no mercy, but he spoke to you so conversationally. He reached one long finger out, tapping the rifle on your back, coming back round to stroke you teasingly along the side of your cheek, holding it so tenderly. His words washed over you, meaningless, until you caught one you could understand as he stood up.

"...sorry." His arm raised, the head of the gavel blocking out the sun, and you took your chance.

Your hand darted, and you flung a handful of brick dust into his eyes as he spat, staggered, cursing. You brought the butt of your rifle round to slam into the side of his head, and although he barely faltered, you ran for your life, darting down alleys, your heart bursting in your ears.

You heard no footsteps chasing you. He could have...but he didn't.

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Just one easy kill.

The others had all gone down so hard, Hiromi thought, stepping into his swing, barely missing the foreign woman, the gavel making a buckled crater in the tarmac instead. Hiromi tsked, annoyed, kissing his teeth. Watching her squirm on the floor to save her life, a worm from a bird, Hiromi's gut churned-- ugly.

Murder was so easy. The power to beat scum at their own game was intoxicating. Hiromi stepped after her, so far removed from his old self. His usual self? He wasn't sure.

His keen eyes built the woman's character, hawkish and unforgiving. Young...naive. Soldier...killer. No Japanese...lazy. Pleading...pathetic. Not fighting...coward. By the time she began to beg Hiromi, she was already barely human in his eyes. Swiping his hair upwards, and tightening his grip for the deathblow, he spat, "English."

She caught his eye, and Hiromi felt the barest seed of guilt in the back of his mind, an itch he could not scratch. She had nodded at him, tears brimming in her eyes, hands raised in placation.

"Innocent," the woman had insisted, "...innocent." Bile rose in Hiromi's throat at the familiar word, and the audacity she had to use it for herself, as if she wasn't rolling in the same pigshit as the rest of them. Hiromi's lip curled, smirking as he rubbed his nose with the side of one long finger.

"Innocent?" He stabbed. Hiromi knelt, talking at you as if you understood.

"What's that? You're the good guy, are you?" He mocked, reaching out to tap the rifle on your back, feeling you flinch beneath him, "Is it this, that makes you innocent, hmm?" He brought his hand to your cheek, stroking it with the blade of his finger, swiping away the tears that had cut a track through the dust and grime, "Or this pretty face, hmmm? Are those big, teary eyes what make you innocent? Don't make me laugh. You're scum, just like the rest of us. And natural law is at play here." He cupped your cheek once, squeezing it with the barest of sincerities in his apology as he stood.

"Sorry," Hiromi offered, lifting his gavel and feeling power churn through him, just and righteous as your executioner.

Hiromi cursed as he felt a spray of grit flung into his face, immediately disarmed by the sordid pain of sand in his eyes, further disorientated by the ear-ringing slam of something into the side of his head. He staggered, faltering.

"Oooh, you piece of shit," Hiromi cooed, vicious, spitting with venom, vision completely obscured as he tried in vain to clear his eyes. He felt you disappear, and he leaned against the wall, laughing despite himself at having been bested. He smiled, the barest tinge of admiration for your tenacity threading through him.

"Alright," Hiromi sniffed, rubbing his nose again as his vision began to clear, "catch you later, I suppose."

Hiromi tried to forget you. He tried to forget his humanity, but each life he took made him sicker, infected by this game.

Every time he closed his eyes, to sleep in some strange home-less, love-less bed, your eyes met his, impeaching him.

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Resources soon ran thin, for one who held no territory. You had your army pack, and rationed out your meagre foodstuffs, always hungry, always on-edge. You had never fought alone, in war.

You had managed to develop quite the skill at hiding, and concealed yourself, cloaked in plain sight, from even the most powerful of those left in the game. Every day that the stragglers were picked off, the stakes ran higher. Every explosive battle you ran from, dodging the falling debris thrown by titans, you felt your inherent value as an easy kill increasing.

You thought of the hook-nosed man who had let you go. Despite his willingness to kill you, you craved human contact, and found warmth in the memory of the heat of his gaze, his hand on your face, desperately trying to translate the words he had spoken to you as he caressed your cheek.

One dewy dawn, you had taken position on a sheltered rooftop, giving you equal measures concealment and oversight. With your rifle drawn, flat on your belly, you felt the ebbs and wanes of a familiar power draw closer. Curiously, it made your belly clench, eager to see the man who could have chased you, but didn't. You were itching to know why. Itching to behold him again.

Your heart leapt as he stepped into the street, at least four stories below you. Even from this distance, you could see the intensity of his furrowed brow, the noble bearing of his shoulders beneath a great black overcoat. His tie hung, dishevelled, loose-knotted. He was hunting.

He paused, tiptoed on a breath...before rolling, gracefully dodging as a knife of Cursed energy ricocheted through the street, splitting it. You gasped, your eye moving away from your rifle lens, watching in awe as he took to battle with another man. While he seemed to hold his own, he appeared distracted, and was buffeted, winded by an almighty hit, knocked onto his back, elbows on the ground.

A strange panic overtook you as your hook-nosed man's assailant bore down on him, power surging, preparing to murder--

-- a gunshot. A brittle, echoing bang. The assailant's head snapped forwards, and he fell, killed instantly, face first on the ground in front of your hook-nosed man.

He panted, his face sprayed with blood. With a few owlish blinks, his eyes tracked upwards. You held your breath, adrenaline coursing through you. As the man stood, eyes fixed on you (in rage? murderous intent? thanks?), you jolted to life and took aim on him.

He did not raise his hands. There was no standoff, as he made no move to save his own life. In the moment that he accepted his death for the attempt he had made on yours, something in you both softened, seeing each other as you saw no others. A gentle impasse. The intimacy of differentiation.

It took everything you had in you to break eye contact, and run.

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Hiromi mulled beneath the shaky warning of your rifle.

You were afraid, he thought as he gazed up at you, so sickeningly grateful for having been chosen by you. The mist of his opponent's blood drifting through the sunrise, picked Hiromi out as somehow preferable, in your mind.

And, why should you not be afraid? He saw you beneath him, again, your eyes soft and begging him for mercy. You had been defenceless and entirely in his palm. He had been relieved, he recalled, that he could kill someone easily. The begging made you passive. Hiromi could have vomitted, sickened by himself.

He stood, arms raised slightly to his sides, his profile illuminated by sweet morning sun, waiting for death to take his hand.

Hiromi felt embraced by your eyes. Wanted. Some companionship, in death...until you refused him his end. The red string between you both seemed to snap as you broke eye contact and ran.

Alone, as the sun broke above the skyline, Hiromi whispered; "Thank you."

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There was no way out. Starving and desperate, days had passed since you had saved your hook-nosed man, and you had crept through haunted streets to a convenience store, unusually well-stocked with food and drink.

You bit your tongue for your own stupidity at having walked into such an obvious trap. No amount of being able to hide one's Cursed energy could compensate for being seen walking into the shop. Crouching now, behind shelves of ramen, tears trembled on your lashes, an aching lump in your throat.

You heard a mocking voice, cooing at you, laughing at you, and you blushed with indignant tearful injustice, not needing language to know when you were being assaulted for your sex. You were afraid of death. You were more afraid of being used beforehand.

With nowhere to hide, and no grit to throw, you tipped your head back and thought of those black embering eyes, holding you in his gaze.

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"Are you hungry?" The voice chirped, teasing, mean, "Come out, baby. I've got something here in my pocket you can taste." A filthy laugh. Slow, easy footsteps. Willing to rape you before he killed you. Hiromi felt himself burn with fury, ready to wring this man's neck with his own two hands.

Hiromi walked the streets easily, now. His power had come on in leaps and bounds, and he both trusted in his own abilities, and feared nothing of death. Not since you had held his life in your hands, and thrown it straight back in his face.

He was a disordered eater at the best of times, but, a sudden faintness from hunger sent him seeking food. Hiromi knew some dirty little spider had built a web at an abandoned store, and did not fear a man who sought to ensnare the desperate.

Let him try me, thought Hiromi as he approached, lit by the sickly orange glow of streetlights, and see where it gets him.

Just a few steps from the entrance, Hiromi paused mid-step, his heart hiccuping in his chest. It was you. Inside the store, your Cursed energy faltering and so overwhelmed by that of the spider. Hiromi's lips parted, to call for you, a hand in the dark. He stopped, gritting his teeth. No-- this would not do, he thought, as he began a hunt of his own.

The spider was so obviously distracted by excitement, thrilled to find a woman in his dirty little trap. He had found you, by the time Hiromi reached you, in time to see you flung, body smashing against the counter, curling and coughing. Hiromi stepped behind the spider, seething, overburdened with terrible strength.

You had looked up in time to see your hook-nosed man wind an arm round your assailant's neck, throttling him, dragging him backwards out of the store. The hook-nosed man's face was twisted, ugly with rage...and for what? For you?

If your Cursed-energy had been no match for that of your assailant, his was dwarfed by that of your rescuer. Still coughing, doubled over on your hands and knees, you crawled to the entrance, watching the streetlights flicker above your hook-nosed man as he choked the life out of your assailant, merciless in his conviction.

You knelt there, drinking in his profile, in that sickly orange glow. His sharply squared jaw. His black overcoat, shrouding him like Death itself. Panting and cursing as his arms shook, your assailant fighting weakly beneath him. Choking the life out of a man, a murder most intimate. For you. Killing, with his bare hands-- for you.

Time hung in suspended animation in these small hours. Your rescuer sighed, the tension releasing from his shoulders as he knelt back on his haunches. He appeared devoid of guilt, at having carried out his sentencing. Slowly, as if fearful of what he would see in your eyes, he turned to you, kneeling in the doorway of the shop.

Your eyes met. You studied each other in silence. He had a way of making you transparent. You had a way of making him exposed. His panting slowed, palms flush to his thighs, offering you a cautious smile, as your eyes glimmered in the dark.

"English," he spoke, by way of greeting.

"Nose," you returned. He frowned, uncertain.

"N..?"

You reached up to stroke your nose, and repeated, with a smile; "Nose."

His hand reached up to mirror yours, realising, and he burst into laughter, rich and genuine. You blushed, burying your face in your hands as he continued to laugh. He wiped his eyes, fingering the hook in his nose again, looking at you with those deep embering eyes that wholly undressed you.

"Nose," he repeated, chuckling, "Subarashī." Your bit your lip in mirth, looking anywhere but at him as he tried to catch your eye again, mischief twinkling in his.

Hiromi stood, stretching his shoulders back with a husky groan, tipping his neck from side to side. He stepped over to you, and you felt, ridiculously, so teenagerish as the odd duality of your hook-nosed man made your belly twist. You saw a long-fingered hand enter your line of sight. You looked at it questioningly. The fingers wiggled in invitation.

With a shaking hand, you took his. He pulled you up and smiled at you, swinging your hand briefly in his before releasing it, waiting for you to step into the shop before he followed. You browsed for food, as if Saturday-Night-Snack-Hunting as a couple, in safe silence.

Shivering as the adrenaline wore off, your stomach clenched with terrified nausea to hear explosions, shouts, drawing ever nearer in the street outside. Your hook-nosed man looked up, hangdog eyes wide, flicking from you, to the street, and back again. He gritted his teeth, bundling packets of food into the pockets of his overcoat.

You found yourself manhandled, his heavy coat suddenly on you. Your rescuer's hands moved deftly, smoothing the coat across your shoulders, searching for words, irritated by his intelligence in one language and his stupidity in another.

"Cold-- hungry-- go," Hiromi pressed in broken English, spinning you as you protested, urging you through the back door. You turned in the doorway, your eyes begging him to...what? To go with you? There was no time, no time--

Hiromi materialised his gavel, and crouched, snarling at you: "GO!" He roared, steeped in regret as you sprinted away, guarding your life like a child.

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Your hook-nosed man began to leave you breadcrumbs; tickets to safe havens, food, shelter, beds. You felt the vestiges of his Cursed-energy wherever you followed his trail, haunted by the path of devastation he left to build you sanctuaries.

Your dialogue budded, and combined with his notes and signs, you began to learn more about him. His notes, secreted away in scrawled English, street signs flipped to point in alternate directions, and crude maps drawn on dust-caked windows, all added colour and life to him.

Hiromi took a little joy, his cold heart popping to life, at the little hearts you drew in the dust; signs of acknowledgement, a tiny thrill.

You found yourself drawn to a bookstore, and scoured the shelves, looking for a particular something, a matching pair. You found hints of him in the pockets of the hook-nosed man's overcoat; a business card, in Japanese. A handkerchief, curiously embroidered with two gold initials-- H.H. A set of housekeys with a key-finder fob. A pair of chewed pens. You still thought of him as "Nose".

Hiromi still thought of you as "English", as he caught himself differentiating you from the others. Still steeped in this depression, this black-dog-misery and ugliness, he saw you, a light in the dark, who hid yourself to protect yourself as well as others, from needless violence.

They were all ugly...except, perhaps, for you.

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You sighed as you slipped into the hot bath, water up to your chin in the great, deep basin of this luxury hotel. You were impressed there was still a hot water supply, and you felt a gleeful coil of naughtiness, knowing you would never usually be able to afford to stay in such opulence, all marble tiles and gold taps.

Fighting for survival did not negate the fundamental craving for little joys, and you took advantage of the selection of complimentary soaps, scouring yourself free of grime with happy hums. You sang to yourself, quiet in the evening hush, just you and your languid splishing--

-- oh. A cautious approach. A familiar power. You clasped the lip of the bath, sinking your body under the water.

"...hello? Nose?" You called out. You heard the click of a lock, quick feet stepping in, locking the door behind him. A single held breath.

"...English?"

You blushed, pressing your lips to your knuckles, white from how tightly you gripped the bath. Hiromi's cheeks prickled faintly, hearing soft splashes from the bathroom, seeing your clothes discarded over the bed, your rifle leaning against it. You cleared your throat, wanting to talk, not knowing where to start.

"Mhm." Hiromi smiled at your little squeak, sitting with a groan and creaking knees, his back against the wall beside the bathroom door. Separated by this thin wall, he reached a hand around the doorway behind him. You giggled to see his long fingered hand offer you a jaunty wave.

"Konbanwa, English," he offered. He jolted to feel your little hand, warm and wet, squeeze his. His thumb grazed over your knuckles, smooth, examining, probing in a way that made your belly tight. You reluctantly released his fingers, humming in thought as you reached out of the bath into your backpack, searching for something.

Momentarily, Hiromi felt something gently tap the side of his head around the bathroom door, and he giggled, a noise which made you paddle your feet in delight. He reached up, taking a Japanese-English dictionary and phrasebook from your hand.

"Ahhhhh!" Hiromi hummed, genuinely thrilled, "Yoi aidea." He skimmed through the book, hunting again, and you paused, listening.

"Good idea!" He stated, confident, and he squirmed to hear you laugh at his janky pronunciation. Hiromi wanted so dearly to see you, to know you were uninjured, and instead scoured his little book again.

"Hurt?" He asked you. You softened, responding automatically.

"Ah...no, I'm...hmm," you flipped through your own book, "...uhm...daijōbu desu?"

Hiromi hummed, satisfied. You talked this way, for some time, gently brushing the outskirts of each others' language and personality. Hiromi corrected you. You corrected him. The bath grew cold. The light began to die behind the windows, casting you both in deep shadow and amber glow.

At some point, in the conversation, your hands had trailed together again. Hiromi now leaned sideways against the wall, his cheek pressed against it, eyes closed as his fingertips grazed the inside of your wrist.

You lay in the bath, shivering, feeling your heartbeat between your legs from such an innocent, intimate touch-- except, it did not feel innocent in intent. Perhaps, that was what made you squirm.

"Stay safe," Hiromi whispered to you, his fingers drawing circles on your palm, his next word crumpling your face with barely restrained tears, "Afraid."

Hiromi bit his lip in anguish, eyes squeezed shut to see you in his mind's eye, so desperately touch-starved as you pressed a kiss to his palm. He felt your lips remain, nose ghosting against his pulse. He imagined those lips on his own, and he was filled with an anxious need to taste you, to lift you from the bath, wrap you up in the bed and his arms, safe.

Fully distracted by thoughts of you and your sweet cries beneath his body, Hiromi almost missed you holding out your book to him, pressed open at the start-- and a name, your name, written neatly on the page. You offered this, all the while wanting to step to him from the bath, and offer him the feel of those clever fingers, examining the rest of your body.

"Oh..." Hiromi whispered, reverent, squeezing your hand as he swiped his thumb over the faint imprint of your written name, repeating it aloud slowly. Hearing him speak your name, almost had you climbing out of the bath and into his lap. You closed your eyes, imagining him crying it out as he peaked, buried deeply inside you. You burned with the urgent need to know him.

Just a few seconds later, Hiromi's hand reached round the corner, offering his own book back to you, with his own name written in your own alphabet, jolted and square.

"Higuruma...Hiromi?" He hummed, happily.

"Hiromi," you repeated, and he hummed again, delighted by your name on his lips. You tucked your dictionary away, thrilled, reaching for a towel.

"It suits you. I love it." Hiromi understood just one word you had uttered, and it sent joy creeping down his spine. He pressed his forehead against the wall.

Pull yourself together, Hiromi, he thought, it's just loneliness and desperation. Nothing else. No amount of logic and self-chastisement stopped his mouth from moving independently of his mind, as he flicked through your dictionary, imbued with your name.

"Bed. Stay. Please." Silence. Hiromi pressed the corner of the dictionary to his head, cursing himself under his breath. Idiot, pathetic little moron, stupid--

"Yes."

Hiromi's stomach swooped, missing a step, hearing you climb out of the bath. You steeled yourself, blushing furiously, to wrap a towel around yourself and pad out to the bedroom. Hiromi turned his back to you, but not before seeing the graceful curve of your leg, the wet cleavage of your breasts, the towel barely skimming the tops of your thighs. He breathed slowly, clawing back his self-control as you dressed behind him.

A long, slow whistle, belonging to neither of you, broke the silence, and your blood ran with ice water.

Voices spoke, Hiromi spitting threats, in this language that still gatekept against your understanding.

You jacked sideways, still topless, seizing your rifle as Hiromi demolished the doorway with a single wide swing of his gavel. You heard laughter from the corridor, and you hurriedly pulled your top and Hiromi's overcoat on, fixing your rifle on your shoulder to take aim.

Hiromi backed up to you, wrapping one arm behind himself and around you, fingers splayed against the small of your back. You understood none of the venom spat between Hiromi and this hidden assailant.

Your nerves on a knife-edge, you sensed movement behind the shattered brickwork of the doorway, and fired, a deafening blow in this enclosed space. A spray of blood and an enraged shout through the drifting plaster-cloud saw you hit your mark, and Hiromi exclaimed, shocked and delighted, squeezing your waist.

"I've seen better shots than that from her, bastard" Hiromi warned, "and if you think she's easy prey, you've got both of us to take down."

"Hiromi," you gasped, hyperventilating, "Hiromi-- Hiromi--"

Silence through the room; Hiromi's ears rang. He pocketed your dictionary, and grasped your cheeks, eyes fixed to yours and wordlessly reassuring you as he turned you towards him from the doorway. You felt your heart bounding in your chest, hands loosening on your rifle as you drank him in, breathed the same air, panting, together--

--it was all too fast. Hiromi's eyes fixing behind you. His panicked shout. Being thrown sideways onto the bed, a glassy smash, a scream that may have been your own--

Hiromi and your hunter plummeted in an outward spray of glass, two inky blots fading into the night.

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You had searched so desperately. Nothing could assure you Hiromi was still alive. There were no breadcrumbs left in the dust; nil but blood, and so much of it, beneath the shattered hotel window, so many stories up.

You had run your hands through it, clotted with the rubble, needing to feel him within the grisly spill-- alas. Too many residuals passed over this land. Too many battles fought, too many lives spent and saved, for clairvoyance to be what repaired your fractured heart.

You steeled yourself. Adversity goaded you to try harder. To do better. You took to the hunt yourself. You amassed points from potshots, hidden in curious places to execute nasty little opportunists who sought dominion over the weak.

While you had had no experience of the Kogane-- the odd, winged shikigami which acted as an interface between the players and the game-- in your passive state, they now became regular visitors, updating you of your points total. You had assumed they could not speak your language-- you were wrong.

Witnessing, from afar, one day, another player asking Kogane a question, your stomach rolled with nausea and hope as you called the black-tailed beast to you.

"Kogane?" The creature appeared with a pop. Your mouth opened, and closed, faltering over your words.

"Kogane, is-- is Hiromi Higuruma a player in the game?"

Silence-- and an answer; "Higuruma Hiromi is a player in the game--"

All of the air left your lungs in an enormous gasp, a heaving cry of relief as you doubled over, your hands cupped over your mouth and nose, tears streaming down around your fingers, before the Kogane had even finished giving its report.

"Thank you-- th--thank you, Kogane," you sobbed, blinded by your own tears. This tiny demon, to whom manners meant nothing, hung impassively. It disappeared with a pop as you spun away, cloaked with conviction.

You turned on a pinhead, cocking your rifle ready, and stalked off through the ruins; all of your steeling wisped away like ashes, your heart on the battlefield, knowing your vulnerability was out there, alive.

You decided now, with a smile at the thought of those beetle-black eyes, to hunt not for business, but for pleasure.

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Hiromi felt the damp all the way to his bones, in these heavy, wet clothes, made heavier still by the excruciating weight of his crimes. The theatre door swung closed behind him, and he leaned his back against the wall, crouching, the palms of his heels pressing so hard into his eyes that he was blinded by lights.

He had fallen beyond salvation, and it gnawed at the rotten wood of him, eating him alive. Feeling his brain judder, his tie too tight, the walls too close, the silence too deafening, Hiromi tried to collect himself. He pressed his palms to his thighs and breathed; in through his nose one two three four five and out through his mouth one two three four five.

Feeling his heart rate slow, full of equal parts light and dark, Hiromi called out into the gloom, straightening slowly.

"Kogane." The creature appeared with a pop, waiting, patient. Hiromi spoke your name, and then, hesitant--

"...is she a player in the game?" A heartbeat. Two. Three.

"Confirmed--"

Hiromi did not hear the rest, buckling to his haunches with a primal cry of gratitude, and a few moments of dry sobs as his fingers raked through his hair. Chest heaving, he breathed again, one two three four five, one two three four five.

In the space taken for one breath, Hiromi decided not to find you. You, who had always chosen not to fight. You, whose pleading eyes still haunted him. You could not be sullied by his rot.

Hiromi stepped out into the night, a porcelain man checkered with cracks, seeking only to rebuild a world worthy of you.

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He's here.

Climbing the stairs, fine piano music rang distant, its notes bittersweet, cherries in kirsch. Your feet carried you unbidden and you ascended, the notes becoming sweeter, feeling him, closer, playing this Siren's song.

Stepping into the doorway of the skyline bar, he must have felt your approach. The lights were low, refracted through a hundred hanging glasses, a hundred under-lit bottles of vim and vigour. The room sprawled out in an expansive, long C-shape, and your heart stuttered to see Hiromi at the end, pale fingers moving across the piano, white-shirt-shoulders burdened by the weight of his song.

You felt him build in the music as you approached, each note demanding more of him, and more and more and more and more--

There was only the briefest hitch in the music, barely perceptible, as you slid onto the bench beside Hiromi. He did not look up, his mouth set in a grim line, his eyes pressed tightly shut.

Consumed by the need to feel his skin on yours, you reached out, your hand ghosting over his. In a flash, Hiromi's hand darted up to grab yours, fingers tangled, as his other hand continued to move, playing this bisected song. A few moments passed, this way, with Hiromi pressing his lips and nose to your knuckles, his face contorted, conflicted-- pained.

"Go," he whispered, breath fanning over your hand, "bad."

"I...I don't--...bad?" You turned towards him, to hold him, and he jerked, twitching away from you, and you felt your heart tug along with him.

"No. Me. I...am bad." You shook your head, more and more fervent as Hiromi twisted away from you, quietly cursing, husky, tortured. He tried to release your hand, and you refused, plaiting your fingers in his, steadfast in a way that filled him with an animalistic urge to appreciate you.

You turned from him, your other hand resting upon the high keys, pressing gentle, uncertain notes. Overwhelmed by your closeness, and your insistent faith in him, Hiromi softened to watch your profile, backlit from the liquid glow of the bar. Your small hand, moving softly over the keys. Your heart beating like butterfly wings in your throat.

"No. Not bad. Lost. Lonely. Sabishī."

Every moment of belief you handed him, pulled Hiromi closer to the light. Swallowing thickly, he brought your joined hands to the keys, laying his palm over the back of yours, overlaying your fingers with his own. He pressed, soft insistent touches, on your fingers, guiding them to play. You felt your belly coil with odd pleasure, captivated by Hiromi's hands, all at once gentle and rough, smart and instinctual--

"Hiromi--"

"No. Stop." Hiromi tensed, his voice rough, fraying alongside his self-control. His hand shook over your own, the notes stopping now. Heat burst through you, certain he felt it too, this dangerous need, and his name forced its way out of you again, a challenge.

"Hiro--"

Hiromi spat venom again, growling and cursing as he stood, lifting you by the waist, sitting you upon the keys with a spray of notes, his arms shaking as they pressed beside you, trapping you in. Nose to nose, his breath on your lips, his face twisted with fury and need, Hiromi whispered to you.

"Stop. My name--" Hiromi shook, on his last thread, half a step away from using you--

When your hand snaked to his tie, tugging him closer, your other hand sinking into the back of his hair, Hiromi snapped.

His lips pressed to yours, hot and hungry, his body closing the rest of the distance to be flush between your thighs. Your mouth opened to him, feeling his urgency as he drank down your stolen breath, one hand tilting your head back to consume you, the other dragging through the plush rolls of your belly and hips.

Every kiss was hot and anguished, punctuated by Hiromi's low rolling voice, not needing language to feel the fervour and vice on his lips-- "--won't be gentle-- I'm sorry I-- I can't--"

You insisted your understanding on him the only way you knew how; fingers working his tie off and draping it round your own neck, locking your legs around him to press his aching cock against your core, undoing his shirt in a desperate flurry, all notes and fingers and tongues and moans.

You tasted rum in his mouth, all spice and brown sugar, and his hand wandered to your throat, feeling your pulse there before tilting you backwards, arched against the hood of the piano. With your head rested back, he spoke to you, shirt now unbuttoned to his navel, cock straining against the material below a trail of black hair.

"--making a mistake to let a monster put his mouth on you, English-- let's see what sounds you can make." Your khaki t-shirt was pulled off over your head, where Hiromi let it catch around your hands, twisting it to bind you. Hiromi kept you gripped this way, leaning over you, caging you in as he gripped the cups of your bra between his teeth, yanking them down to free your breasts.

Hiromi shuddered and moaned, feeling a drop of pre-cum soak into his boxers, as he flattened his tongue over your nipple, rolling, tasting, pulling you between his lips, nuzzling from side to side like an animal. You mewled, jutting your hips involuntarily, and Hiromi pressed back, pleasuring you with rough, sharp thrusts against your clothed pussy.

Hiromi leaned back, releasing your nipple with a hard suck, gazing down at where he fucked himself against you, mesmerised by the way you shivered and humped against his cock. Unabashed, his words falling over you like strange-eyed constellations, Hiromi fucked you with his voice--

"--cum like this, and I'll give you my fingers...cum like that, and I'll give you my tongue-- fuck, I'll eat you alive, you fucking goddess--"

As Hiromi spoke, all twisted rage and growls, his hips slammed into you, spurred on by your squeaks and whimpers, gripping the fat of your hips to ram your core against him. The pleasure was brutal, all harsh fabric friction and Hiromi's unrestrained adoration, and you tried to hold yourself together as you were dragged to orgasm, your frantic hands pressing disjointed chords on the keys beneath you.

Hiromi wanted to, needed to cum like this, with you, knowing he'd be able to continue fucking you after until he collapsed in your arms from exhaustion. Pausing only briefly to reach into his boxers, and angle his angry, throbbing cock upwards so the bulbous tip pressed between his waistband and belly, Hiromi's eyes rolled back in unadulterated ecstasy as he continued to fuck you against him.

You were both close, having been unfinished even by yourselves for weeks, and Hiromi's eyes burned into yours, feral with the need for you to finish with him, feeling your thighs tense around him as you babbled, fully understanding your meaning behind the nonsense--

"--gonna cum-- please-- Hiromi-- harder--"

You pressed back against the piano, arching with a high-pitched cry as hot pleasure burst through you, from your deeply aching clit outwards, crackling through your fingers, all white-hot sparks and embers. Watching you convulse against him, angling his hips to rut his trapped cock tip, feeling his thighs and belly set alight with the force of his orgasm, his hands planted either side of you, back twitching as he came with a bark.

Still riding the last waves of your orgasm, you watched him in fascination. The sight of Hiromi's cum spurting in long, white ropes onto his navel and yours, his agonised, fractured gasps, had you humping against the underside of his cock again, dragging out your peak to hear him whimper, cock twitching against your core. Your hand drifted to his belly, stroking the cum between your fingertips in a blissful haze, squeezing a thumb under the foreskin of his exposed cockhead, stroking his slit with his own lubrication.

Hiromi convulsed and growled at you, clasping your hand against him, dopey and shaking as you drank his reaction from his eyes, thumb still circling his cockhead, slippery with his seed.

"St--st--aaaaahhh..." You shushed Hiromi's weak cries, grazing your tongue over his lips, delighted as he twitched in your hand, weak little spurts of cum oozing onto your fingers. Hiromi let you continue like this, for a few seconds, before wrenching your hand away, plaiting your fingers into his own and nuzzling into you furiously. His heart leapt to hear you giggle as he bit into you, still to desperate, everything still not enough to take away this pain and this filth and this misery--

His other hand wandered down, stroking down the rolls of your belly, pinching, nails grazing, digging in all the way to your belt, undoing it with military efficiency. Not bothering to undo the button, he yanked down the zip instead, giving him enough room to manoeuvre his hand between your skin and the fabric, shucking your underwear aside to cup the wet heat of your pussy in one long hand.

Dipping his hand out to collect the cum off your belly, he thrust his hand back inside against your pussy again, teeth gritted and bared as he drank down your reactions now. He was satisfied to see the playful glint in your eyes flicker, your eyebrows raised in shock and overstimulation, teeth sinking into your lip as he rubbed your clit roughly, cum-sticky fingers rubbing broad strokes side to side across it.

"--two can play at that game, sweetheart...feels good? More? Harder?" Hiromi pressed you, in these words you didn't understand, and laughed, darkly satisfied as you wiggled beneath his hands, one hand resting lightly on your throat as you tried in vain to scoot away from him, your breath releasing in airy whimpers.

"No answer?" Hiromi moved his fingers faster, harder, your pussy squelching with your mixed cum inside your trousers, feeling you writhe beneath them, "I'll decide for you then."

Hiromi urged your orgasm to build, faster and harder this time, teeth gritted as he dragged you to the edge, growling into you as his tongue flicked roughly over your nipple--

"--come on-- know you can do it-- I'll go as hard as you like, come on, good girl--ah, there-- good girrrrllll..." Hiromi softened his movements, fingers undulating against your pussy as he pulled another orgasm from you, moving one finger from your throat to dip into your mouth, shuddering as you sucked it around your cries and whimpers.

Hiromi felt his cock beginning to stir to life again, and he committed you to memory like this, draped over the piano, wet breasts heaving, his seed dripping down your belly, eyes glazed, body supple.

Another word, that he did know in English, slipped from him, as he dropped to his knees before you, worshiping at this otherworldly alter in the moonlight; "Beautiful."

You blushed, voice catching in your throat as Hiromi smiled up at you, soft and captive in his sincerity as he unbuttoned your trousers, easing them, with your underwear, gently to your ankles, and off. Feeling suddenly so exposed, so flawed, you squeezed your eyes shut. You felt Hiromi grip your ankle with such tenderness, pressing a long, languid kiss to the delicate bones on the inside.

"English," Hiromi called, beckoning you back to him. You shook your head, blushing, eyes still closed, and he insisted. "English, please--" your eyes opened, uncertain, and Hiromi hummed in satisfaction as he began to kiss his way up your inner legs, "--beautiful."

Sighing and leaning back, one arm over your eyes, your heart bursting with the oddity of having fallen in love like this, you felt safe behind your language barrier as you spoke without a filter; "Oh, Nose. I love you. I really do."

Hiromi paused, stunned and ecstatic, his lips still on your inner thigh. He shocked you both, at how quickly his grasp of your language had come along; "And I love you, English." Hiromi chuckled with genuine glee as you clapped your hands over your face, mortified. Hiromi nuzzled into you, wickedly playful, but soon overtaken by this violent urge again--

"And...I love--" you squealed as you felt Hiromi force your thighs apart, sinking his tongue and nose quickly between your folds, groaning as he tasted the heady mix of his and your cum around your clit. His cock, almost fully hard again, throbbed, tightening his waistband as the blood rushed to it again. Hiromi reached down, releasing his cock with a sigh.

He took his time, lifting your thighs over his shoulders as he lapped at you, dipping his tongue into your entrance, tasting you, teasing you. You leaned, watching him again, and he looked up at you, hooded eyes burning as he nuzzled his nose against your clit, and held his own cock in his hand, stroking slowly. You felt jolts of voyeuristic pleasure, watching him masturbate himself to the taste of you.

"I...I like that," you whispered to him, your hand moving down to graze your nails against his scalp. You watched Hiromi like pornography as he shuddered, his cock leaping in his hand, your eyes fixed intently on his hand gliding up and down his length as you felt your pleasure beginning to crescendo yet again.

"More, I--" you moved your hand in the air as if you were the one stroking Hiromi's cock, mimicking faster movements, "--faster, Hiromi." Hiromi hummed in understanding, groaning sandy little groans into your pussy now as his hand sped up, jacking himself off harder, feeling your pussy clench around nothing beneath his tongue as you watched him, your keening cries getting higher and higher until--

-- you came again, trembling with the fluttering soft pleasure of your third orgasm, thighs clamping around Hiromi's head as he sucked your clit gently between his lips. Hiromi panted, gripping the base of his cock, delaying his high, fingers wet with more pre-cum, desperate to drag you to the floor and finish using you.

Pulling his mouth away, his hands trembling on your thighs, Hiromi's face was unreadable as he looked at the floor. Standing, dishevelled and sweating, looking up at you with feral hunger, his cock still twitching in his hand, you could see the barest vestiges of Hiromi pleading you for permission, with those exquisite dark eyes--

All it took from you was a nod. Hiromi pounced, wiry arms deceptively strong as he lifted you, legs locked around his waist, nose nuzzling against yours, teeth nipping your lips with a rumble. Hiromi whispered his mother tongue against your mouth, reaching out one hand for his overcoat, and tossing it into the floor, before laying you on your front, sinking his teeth into your shoulder blade with bruising force.

"--you're beautiful, and you're good, and I don't deserve you-- fuck, I need you now, I--I need--"

Hiromi panted above you, barely restraining himself from slamming into you immediately as he looped an arm round your neck and chest, pulling you up and forcing your back to arch. Ghosting his nose over your ear, he whispered your name, making you shiver and squirm, certain you'd break unless you felt him inside you soon.

"Ready, English?" You trembled, nodding, head tipped back as his cock grazed against your slippery folds. One hand cupped your arse, stroking softly, before slapping, Hiromi captivated by its plush jiggle against his fingers, how you cried out, how your skin flushed so deliciously.

Not holding back, Hiromi slammed into you, one forearm planted to the floor while the other restrained you against him, cupping your breasts in one squeezing hand. He shook, cursing, his teeth in your shoulder, as he felt the tip of his cock kiss your gummy walls, feeling your pussy clench around him in shock.

Prone, hands clawing at his overcoat, Hiromi felt enormous inside you, so swollen and plush after waiting to be filled for so long. You whimpered, resting your head sideways against his clutching bicep, feeling the muscle tense and jump as he rammed into you at a relentless pace, still speaking husky reassurances to you in his native tongue.

"--rest, just-- keep still and let me hold you, I-- I can't slow down anymore--"

Feeling simultaneously used and protected, caged in like this for him to chase his own pleasure, your breath came in ragged gasps, both hands now clutching the forearm across your neck and chest, head swimming with the instinctively blissful fullness of his cock, tightly sleeved within you. You felt your belly jolt from the force of Hiromi's thrusts, and pressed up towards him, proud to hear him moan in response.

Hiromi fucked you with abandon, needing this release, needing to shed his sin and worthlessness, his heart leaping to feel you fall apart beneath him. His hips began to stutter, strength abandoning him as his orgasm approached, moaning deep breaking moans in your ear, nipping, holding your neck in his teeth.

His legs buckling beneath him, Hiromi cried out in bliss, his arm shaking around you, hips flush against your arse, cock twitching long, hot spurts of cum inside your walls, feeling you pulse around him, sucking him in. You revelled in the glorious feeling of him twitching deep inside you, your belly hot and clenching as his seed seeped out between your clenched thighs. Hiromi lay above you, panting, pressing soft kisses into your hair, using his arm to roll you sideways with him, covering you both with his overcoat.

With his arm beneath your head, the other lazily stroking the curve of your waist and hips, Hiromi laughed lazily behind you.

"You love me, English, hmm?" Hiromi laughed again as you clapped your hands to your face.

"Stop, Hiromi, stop--" you cried, blushing all the way to your toes as he squeezed you closer, "-- or I will shoot you." Hiromi lifted his head, peering mulishly at you, one eyebrow raised. You scowled, pointing to your gun, and then at him, and he gasped in mock horror.

"Ara ara," he rumbled, teasing you in alien words, "so violent when you're meant to be happy."

You remembered these sweet small hours the most, after the horrors that came. You remembered lying in each others' arms, sticky and teasing. You remembered sneaking to the bathrooms, splashing each other at the sinks as you cleaned up as best as you could. You remembered laughing as Hiromi cursed, trying to clean the residual cum off your clothes. You remembered Hiromi calling for you, afraid, anxious, before you ducked back up from behind the bar, your arms full of snacks and drinks. You remembered lying beneath the piano, gazing out across the city, flicking peanuts at each other, sharing slow, lazy kisses. You remembered naively seeing a future between you, a happy life with none of this unthinkable chaos.

It was your fault, you cursed yourself, vomiting and wracked with sobs, staggering away from the devastation. If you had been able to develop your power, and pose a real threat, Hiromi wouldn't have been burdened with such a liability.

Lost in each other again, nose to nose beneath the piano, your instincts had kicked in just fast enough to kick Hiromi away, saving his life as the floor between you both split with dreadful electricity. A strange-haired, wild-eyed boy burst through the room on a voltage, bottles smashing, the floor splitting, your rifle disappearing into the chasm as Hiromi shouted for you, urging you, ordering you-- you were sure, to move, to run, to save yourself and leave him.

You could do none of them, your military training meaning nothing to this god. You could do nothing when Hiromi stepped into his path, defending you, fighting tooth and nail. You could do nothing as the floors split beneath him, dragging them down in lightning flashes, horrifying rumbles. You had fled from the collapse, leaping flights of stairs one at a time, possessed by some strange force. You had not felt Hiromi again. Powerful though he was, you could not see how he could walk out of such a fight alive.

Putting all the dregs of your energy into hiding, refusing to let Hiromi's sacrifice be in vain, you cried yourself to sleep, nose in Hiromi's overcoat, his cum still cooling between your thighs.

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Each day merged into the next. Time had lost meaning. While you had the urge to fight before loving Hiromi, to have loved and lost him broke you and the future you may have had. The battleground was no place for someone such as yourself now. You cursed the injustice of it all.

Cold, dirty and exhausted, your head rested sideways against an industrial bin, praying the rain would wipe your soul clean.

You had translated his business card, with your little dictionary--

Lawyer. Higuruma Hiromi, Criminal Defence Lawyer.

Knowing this detail of his life, a sweet overlay of understanding dawned upon you, his character suddenly so understandable, his anguish shooting through you like knives, and all too late, too late--

"...English?"

Your head jerked up, to the end of the alleyway. Silhouetted, dripping in the rain, bleeding and bruised but impossibly alive--

Your face crumpled, pressed into your wet sleeves, shaking. Slow splashing footsteps approached you, Hiromi kneeling in front of you, a hand coming out to graze through your hair.

He opened your dictionary, dusty and bloodstained, before flicking to a dog-eared page;

"Found you."

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pseudowho · 5 months

Text

Jus in Bello: A Judicious Domain

Hiromi Higuruma is thrown out by his wife, the reader, rejected and broken after developing his Cursed power. Can she bring him home when he becomes embroiled in the Culling Game?

Warnings: Very angsty smut, dubcon at points

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"I declare my intent to participate in the Culling Game."

Your words ring through the chamber, your eyes meeting with Yuuji and Megumi, and you swallow your terror with quiet determination. You would enter Tokyo Colony One together.

Their aim? To hunt Hiromi Higuruma, to strike a bargain, or to eradicate him.

Your aim? To find your husband...to warn him, or bring him home.

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Sorcerers with non-Sorcerer spouses were known to be notoriously secretive about their private lives. While most of these non-Sorcerer spouses knew about the unique profession of their husband or wife, it was an academic knowledge at best; without the possession of Cursed sight, or a Cursed technique, their ability to comprehend the job was as remote to them as Heaven from Earth.

This was how it always had been, between you and Hiromi, passing, often, like ships in the night, as you tried to balance your work and home lives. Your love was so often enacted in the dark warmth of the night, rolling slowly towards his cool body as his weight crept into bed, hands and mouths seeking each other for comfort; gentle touches between legs, desperate kisses on necks. The love between Hiromi and you ran deep like still waters; decisive, steadfast, white-hot adoration.

Until Hiromi began to crack under the weight of supporting justice in an unwinnable system. Until Kenjaku had crept through the cracks, rooting Hiromi with such fierce Cursed energy as you had ever beheld. Until Hiromi became gripped by violent righteousness, becoming a hungry monster, fervent and jaded.

You fought to save Hiromi from himself, trying to claw him back from his own transgressions, down a path so contrary to what he really believed in. His resentment of you grew; how had you held so much power for so long, and not used it to help him win fights? And why were you trying to keep him from his own power, now?

In bitter tears, and rejected protection, Hiromi's ship drifted from yours. You remained steadfast in deep waters as always, a lighthouse. Until, one night, in pure hot contention, you threw Hiromi away from you, out of your home, demanding that he never return; he left, black eyes flat and unreadable, and you stayed, feeling the world crumble beneath your feet, your love unwavering, unfulfilled.

In the rising of the sun, you had returned from Shibuya, broken and grieving, part of your soul left behind with the bodies of your friends, colleagues and students. You got home, numb. You showered, numb. You looked into the fridge, starving, with no appetite. You went to bed, and waited for the gentle weight of Hiromi...which never came. You went through the motions with the other Sorcerers, who had no knowledge of your husband or his name. You watched as Kenjaku enacted a sickening new 'game', to usher in a new Golden Era of Jujutsu Sorcery.

When you learned of Hiromi's involvement in The Culling Game, you remained outwardly unaffected to your colleagues and students. Swiftly excusing yourself at the first opportunity, you staggered outside, scattered and vomiting in the bushes as you shook and wept, initially resigned to the cruel fate your husband now had to face. Initially.

As talk of entering the Culling Game to recruit top-scoring players to the cause began, you began to formulate your own plan. Your loyalty was, first and foremost, to your husband. You would save Hiromi, or die trying. You knew you would have to convince him to surrender, run with him, or fight him yourself. You had grimly considered each option as likely. You had grimly considered that your husband had left you, incensed by your rejection, and may now very well exceed you in terms of strength.

You were prepared to find yourself at Hiromi Higuruma's mercy.

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He had found you so much faster than you thought he would.

Hiromi's power was overwhelming, and in Tokyo's first colony, you followed the trail of his murder and destruction, hunting him down in a way that only someone who knew him could do. Your stomach twisted at the thought of betraying Megumi and Yuuji, lying with a smile as you sent them off to the fight.

You were fresh from Shibuya, nerves raw and frayed, crackling with potential like split live cables. You found that the unavoidable murder of a few weak links who targeted you, was surprisingly easy. You were blinkered by your aim, heart pounding with excitement and dread in equal measures, desperate to hold Hiromi again.

As you stood alone in a darkened theatre, the lush red seats hauntingly empty as you tried to get your bearings, your stomach twisted to hear a familiar voice above you.

"Domain expansion-- deadly sentencing."

You felt a hook behind your navel, a swooping, dragging pull as you lost your Cursed energy and dropped into an empty courtroom all at once.

Almost empty.

"I didn't think our marriage was so dreadful that you'd hunt me down to murder me, darling." Your knees wobbled as you took to the stand, a familiar warm hand gripping your elbow to stabilise you, dropping you unceremoniously against the wooden podium. You looked up to those familiar unruly spikes of black hair walking away from you to his side of the court.

"Hiromi," you gasped, his touch still searing on your skin, "you need to listen to me--" You blinked, monologue interrupted as Hiromi stood before you, his face straining to remain impassive, flanked by a bizarre, black-winged, masked creature. Hiromi's thick eyebrows connected in a deep scowl, his lips drawn up in disgust as he surveyed you.

"You need to know your place," he snarled, "you're not in charge here." Hiromi flipped a brown paper envelope in his hands, tapping it against his palm. "You have some charges to answer to...my love." You gulped, Hiromi's voice softening for a moment, sounding almost sorry.

You trembled, fully aware that you were powerless in his domain, and tears stung in your nose. You moved to step down and walk towards Hiromi, but his scowl only deepened, chin dipped, as Hiromi radiated fury and a wicked Cursed energy. You released a dry sob and leaned forwards on the podium on your elbows, your head in your hands, gut-churningly overwhelmed by him; wanting him home, wanting him safe, wanting him back to the Hiromi you knew.

You couldn't deny what an intimidating figure he posed now; slim, suited, hook-nosed and wrathful, you felt a familiar want for him stir in your gut, certain that you could escape together even if you couldn't convince him to join the others. You even preferred the former, captivated by the power coiling off him.

You swallowed, speaking, shaking; "What are the charges against me?"

Something hot and vengeful burned in Hiromi's eyes; "Spousal abandonment." Another sob wracked from your chest, appalled by the accusation, deeply wounded.

"I never walked away from you, Hiromi," you cried, voice breaking as you impeached him, "I--"

"Our evidence," Hiromi continued, eyes scorching into you as you stared each other down in bitter contention, "items one to ten, prepared for the defendant's examination." Hiromi spun the brown envelope to you, and it scattered items to your podium as it burst its contents on impact.

You picked up the items with trembling hands, agonised by them all, your heart sinking into your stomach as you beheld the varied contents of your marriage to Hiromi; your marriage certificate. A photograph, of your first kiss as man and wife, youthful joy on both of your faces. Your wedding vows, two neatly written pieces of paper, feeling Hiromi's intense, determined commitment to you rise up from the paper as you had when he had first spoken his vows to you. A short love letter from him, to you. A short love letter from you, to him. A stack of post-it notes you had left on the fridge, and in each others' lunch boxes. A bloodied dishcloth, from where Hiromi had accidentally cut his hand on a kitchen knife during your first fight about his new powers. A frantically handwritten apology note from Hiromi, to you. And a single, solitary hotel-room receipt, from the night you had thrown him from your home.

You knelt behind the podium, crying your heart out as you gathered these treasures, putting them back in the envelope and clutching them to your chest. Hiromi's stomach roiled with the fury and agony of your rejection, torn between wanting you to feel his pain, and wanting to comfort you in yours. He felt nauseous, unable to stop this courtroom charade now he had started it. He gulped back his feelings for you, eyes flinty and dark once more.

"How does the defendant plead?"

"Hiromi, I--"

"How does the defendant plead?"

"Stop it, I would never--"

A voice rising, deep, commanding, "How does the defendant plead?"

"I will always want you."

Silence fell again in the courtroom, only punctuated by the quiet, heaving sobs coming from behind your podium. Hiromi stared at the floor, flat and disconnected, "The defendant pleads...not guilty."

You heard a soft sigh from Hiromi as he continued, "Our second piece of evidence--"

You hung on bated breath, listening, waiting...until nothing came. Still clutching the envelope to your chest, tear-stained and shaking, you stood. Hiromi stood directly in front of your podium now, looking up to you from the floor. He said nothing, and his eyes glistened with reproach, his arms slightly raised to his sides, palms facing you as if in crucifixion.

"Your...your second piece of evidence?" you asked, weary, drained.

"Me. Being here. Right now." You blinked, not understanding for a moment.

"I...Hiromi, I don't--"

"I'm here," he pressed, heated and furious as he climbed your steps towards you, "and why would I be here, in this godforsaken pit, if you hadn't forsaken me first?" An accusatory finger stabbed the air between you, Hiromi hissing in rage, tears brimming in his lovely dark eyes. You reached up to take his hand, silently pleading, and he let you for a moment, torn, before ripping his hand away from you, spinning on his heels to walk back down the steps.

You flung your arms round his neck from behind, "Hiromi, don't--" His strong hands grasped yours, peeling them from his body and fixing them behind your back, pinning your body against the podium with his own. You couldn't move as you gasped, weeping, and Hiromi gripped you in place, white-knuckled and trembling.

"Why don't you want me anymore?" He raged at you, his mouth hot against your ear, "After everything we've been through, and I needed you to help me, and instead I end up thrown out like a dog--"

"-- I've tried to help you, to keep you away from the Jujutsu world, this miserable life--"

"-- I had no choice, this was forced on me, there's no way out of this now--"

"-- you've killed people, Hiromi."

Silence again, Hiromi panting against you, body hot and thrumming. He sniffed, squeezing your wrists as he pressed his face into your shoulder.

"They were...ugly. Ruthless monsters. Not people." Hiromi was silent again. You were lost in the bliss of his wiry body and sharp strength against yours. The raw emotion of the fight burned in your belly, seeking release.

"You were...my one constant. Soft, and beautiful and strong, and I-- I could always come home to you, until you-- you--"

Your face crumpled again, overwhelmed all of a sudden as your righteousness left you and you were wracked with guilt at having given up on him. You turned your head, stroking his hair with your cheek, tears dampening the black strands, dishevelled now. Soft and vulnerable for a moment, you felt Hiromi's shoulders tense against you, set in a hard line, and he bit into your shoulder with barely restrained aggression.

"But you lied," he urged, voice low and hushed against your neck as you whimpered into the pain, pressing yourself back against him, "you do want me, don't you?" Hiromi's nose and lips brushed against your neck, one hand remaining cuffed around your wrists, and the other creeping up to grip your throat and jaw. You coughed, alarmed, quivering.

"I don't know what punishment my domain will condemn you to," Hiromi whispered, trailing a long, languid lick up the side of your neck, tasting your sweat, fear, and regret, "and I don't know how this will end for me."

Hiromi's whole body was pressed against you, and you could feel the outline of his cock, solid against your back, as his hand slipped down from your throat, slipping under your shirt and bra to idly roll your nipple between his fingers as you keened at him.

"And even though whatever we had is soiled now," he croaked, his lips and nose still buried deep in your hair, his grieving face twisted with despair, "we should enjoy each other one last time, as husband and wife."

You hiccuped, breath catching on the lump in your throat, swallowing painfully, "Come back home, Hiromi. Or let me come with you, anything, as long as we--"

"-- as long as we're...together?" Hiromi scoffed lightly, terse and bitter, still tenderly squeezing your breast as he kept you pinned, his ministrations belying the anger you still felt brimming below the surface. He was grimly satisfied to feel you tremble under his hands, punishing you before your judgement had been passed.

"See, I used to think that," his hand left your breast to your noises of protest, but you shivered as it slipped down across your belly, deftly undoing your trousers, "and then, well...you know the rest. It was up to you, after all." Your face burned with shame at having your rejection thrown back at you.

You cried out as Hiromi shoved his hand roughly down the front of your trousers, cupping your sex with a possessive squeeze. He swiped your underwear to the sides, pressing two fingers harshly against your clit, groaning at your wetness as you bucked, whimpering. Your hands twisted in anguish, seeking freedom, and Hiromi denied you, pressing your upper body flat on the podium, lifting you so your toes brushed against the floor.

You sobbed your pleasure as Hiromi worked practiced strokes between your puffy lips, softly pinching your clit and rolling it between his forefinger and thumb as you bucked, overstimulating without being allowed to cum, drawn to tears with sharp pangs of pleasure and pain.

Hiromi punctuated his words with barely-restrained pinches of your clit, leaving your toes curling as you twisted and writhed under him, crying out and begging him for release; "You always wanted me," pinch, "you still want me," pinch, "and you've broken it beyond repair," pinch, "but I'm fucking sure you're completely ruined for anyone other than me," he growled, rubbing tight circles on you now, his hand wet with your arousal settling in his palm, and you mewled, high-pitched and desperate, pinned and shaking under his hands.

As he leaned into you, bucking his clothed erection against the swell of your arse, he shuddered in satisfaction as your thighs clenched together, your struggling fading as he brought you to orgasm, softly whimpering through a haze of pleasure and regret. Hiromi continued to rub slow circles, hushing you gently, bringing you down from your orgasm as he undid his trousers, grasping his twitching cock and pulling it free.

As you came down from your high and your vision cleared, your eyes met the impassive blank gaze of Hiromi's bizarre Cursed creature, and you hid your face in the podium, flushing with shame, feeling Hiromi yank your trousers and underwear down behind you.

"Hiromi," you shook, breathless and weak for him, "let me kiss you, please--" Hiromi chuckled again, humourless and gravelly. You jumped as felt him stroke the hot, leaking head of his cock up and down between your folds, jolting with sensitivity every time it brushed over your clit.

"I don't think so. We shouldn't stay too attached, should we?" You cried out, aching pussy filled instantly as Hiromi rammed into it, squeaking and squirming with blinding pleasure as Hiromi grunted behind you, his spare hand shaking as it dug into the plush of your hips, holding you in place against the cool wood of the podium.

The blinding pleasure was overwhelming as Hiromi pounded into you, wet slaps and his groans of ecstasy echoing through the dull silence of the courtroom. Your knees buckled, the podium taking your full weight as you felt his swollen tip slam repeatedly into your cervix, feeling sharp pangs in your belly every time it struck. Hiromi's grip on your wrists was painfully tight, your breasts crushed to your chest, nipples rubbing hard against the podium with the force of Hiromi's thrusts, and you felt his rage with every snap of his hips, praying you would be forgiven for your crimes against him after he had finished.

Feeling your core, hot, wet and pulsing around him, Hiromi slammed into you, trying to dull the odd duality of wanting to pull you desperately into his arms, and wanting deeply to hurt you as you had hurt him with your betrayal. His nose and eyes stinging with tears, and blood roaring through his ears, Hiromi spat out his rage and heartbreak as he came with a shout, holding himself into you deeply, feeling himself empty, heart throbbing and numbed by his release.

Hiromi shook, still seething, blinking back tears of rage as he pulled harshly out of you, stepping back, leaving you cold and empty on the podium, your overstimulated pussy fluttering around nothing. Hiromi stared at you, shaking and tear-stained and still ready to take him back, but still wanting to tame him, watching his seed trickle, white and thick, down the lips of your pussy, dripping to the floor of his domain. Loosening his tie with one quick pull, he unbuttoned the top of his shirt, overheating.

"Let's make sure we do this properly, hmm? For old time's sake," chimed Hiromi as he turned you around to face him, lifting you by the waist to sit on the edge of the podium. You raised your hands to his face, clasping his cheeks as you gazed into his eyes trying to find your Hiromi still in there. You saw him, lost behind a veil of someone darker, much more broken than he had been before you had thrown him out of your home, and your lips puckered, drawing together as you tried to hold back tears again.

Hiromi sighed as you held his cheeks, feeling the day-old stubble growing there. You leaned in to kiss him, and he ducked to avoid you, latching sharply onto one freed nipple as his hand squeezed the other breast, tearing your shirt open at the buttons. You gasped, sinking your hands into his hair and gripping your thighs around him to hold him close.

Hiromi reached up, firmly untangling your hands from his hair, his jaw clenched; "Hands to yourself. Or we'll have to tie them out of the way." You cringed, reluctantly putting your hands to your sides as Hiromi gradually nosed his way down your body, stopping to nip at the sensitive skin of your belly, not once kissing you.

You fell into the little touch Hiromi was giving you so easily, a part of you still cold and empty by his enforced penalty of withholding affection and intimacy. The longing made you all the more eager, grasping at whatever he would give you. You shivered as his mouth reached your thighs, nipping and sucking gently on the soft skin grazing the edge of your pussy. Lost in the delight of his mouth on you, a hand slipped down again to sink into Hiromi's hair.

He stopped immediately and you gasped, apologising in a babbling rush. Hiromi rose, hooded eyes looking at you in disgust, lips curled and nose wrinkled.

"Please-- I'm sorry, Hiromi...please--" Hiromi hesitated briefly, before raising his hands to slowly grip yours together again, not breaking eye contact.

"Final warning," he snipped, brittle and threatening. You gulped, nodding quickly. Hiromi's mouth returned to your thighs. When his nose and tongue finally slipped between your folds, experienced in his role as the only man who pleasured you, he tasted you with the fervour of a man determined to commit you to memory.

Hiromi heard you crying out above him, your sweet sounds soaked up and stored away in his mind, and he ground his nose against your clit, dipping a tongue into you to taste how the two of you were together, groaning as he felt himself begin to harden again.

Hypersensitive from the rough treatment of Hiromi's hands, you begged and pleaded to Hiromi, fingers clawing at the wooden podium, your whole pussy aching with all it had received and all that was yet to come.

Something in your belly snapped as you came, hard, calling Hiromi's name as he continued to nuzzle into you, lost, desperate to soak up your affections one last time. Barely stopping to let you come down from your high, Hiromi rose up, lifting you to kick your trousers and underwear away, and wrap your legs around his waist.

Hiromi threw his suit jacket to the floor of the stand, laying you down on it with such warmth that you could have wept again, and Hiromi laid himself flat to you, raising your thighs to cradle his hips, encouraging you to squeeze him as he slipped his cock easily into you again, slippery from the cum he had already left behind. You mewled, full and ecstatic.

Nose to nose, Hiromi plaited his fingers with yours and gripped them, your forearm flush with his as he leaned over your head. Moving within you, slow and thorough, the head of his cock examining every inch of you, Hiromi sunk his face into your neck, kissing you, promising you.

"I never stopped loving you," he urged, panting softly as you raised your hips in tandem with his thrusts, "I never-- I never did-- never will..." You gasped, pressing your lips to his, as sweet and optimistic as your first kiss...but haunted now, by something dark and tainted.

You and Hiromi moved together, gentle and quiet, as if alone in your bedroom in the dead of night again, and you felt the familiar deep warmth spread through your belly and thighs as you approached your peak again. Hiromi knew, knowing your body by flesh-memory now, and he tilted your hips against him, hitting deeper now, barely pulling out.

"Together," he insisted, pink-cheeked and euphoric. He felt you clench around him, drinking down your moans as he kissed you, ecstasy bursting through him as he came again, knees to the floor, weakened, his anguish and turmoil released in solemn finality.

He stayed for just a few seconds. With a soft sigh, he pulled out of you with a groan, standing and tucking himself back into his trousers, adjusting his suit, pulling his tie back on with practiced hands. You dressed, quiet and full of dread, desperate for an answer- you knew Hiromi had already made up his mind.

"We're done." His voice, quiet and considered, the Hiromi you knew, pierced you like a knife. You shook, picking up the envelope with the remnants of your life together.

"Come with m--"

"I won't come with you. You made your decision. I...have had mine made for me. All that's left for us to do, is to stand by them." Hiromi turned his back on you, "The prosecution rests. All charges have been dropped."

You reeled at Hiromi's final rejection, cold and weeping. His domain collapsed around you, and you found yourself sat in the dusty chill of the old theatre. Hiromi stepped away from you, ignoring you as you called out to him.

As he reached the door, he stopped, gripping the doorframe with a shaking hand; "I'd like to say I'll come home, if I win this. But whatever we had...it's gone. I can't-- I can't trust you anymore." Hiromi left into the night, the door swinging shut behind him.

By the time you had reached the door, sprinting out into the night, Hiromi Higuruma was gone, and you were alone once more, his conviction of you passed and enacted with a final kiss goodbye

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This so nearly had a different ending, but I did what I felt was true to his character.

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