----------------------------------------------------------------------- | ZENKI JIDAI | |---------------------------------------------------------------------| | | | by Asia-T | | http://dungeon.taisa-labs.com/ | | | | Original story: | | Saturday, July 21, 2001 | | Modified: | | Sunday, July 22, 2001 || | | | |---------------------------------------------------------------------| | LEMON/YAOI! Two hundred years after the end of the ZENKI story, | | the demons engage in a power struggle against the humans, and the | | outcome of the war seems certain... Until an enemy with Chiaki's | | face stands before the mightiest of demon gods! LEMON/YAOI! | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- CHAPTER 6 "Chiaki, please! Calm down!" Goki pleaded, holding her tightly in his arms. "Shiaki! Shiaki! My name is Shiaki! LET ME GO!!" she squealed once more before she smashed her knee into his demonhood. The look that crossed Goki's face was not a pleasant one. Still, he did not release her. Shiaki hadn't meant to attack him so brutally. She was really just very self-conscious about having no pants on, and was trying to cover up by twisting her body, since Goki had her arms pinned to her sides. The door suddenly slammed open, announcing Zenki's presence. So hard was it pushed into the wall that it splintered on its outer edge. With a glare and a snarl, he charged Goki. Shiaki was forcefully thrust out of the way by the red demon. She bounced off her bottom on the floor a couple of times, and cringed for some moments thereafter, before she snapped back into modesty, squeezing her bare legs shut, and turning a bright shade of red. "Zenki, what are you doing?!" Goki cried. Zenki responded by cracking a fist in his face. Goki cradled his abused jaw, and there was a pause before he looked up from the floor and back to Zenki. And attacked him. The two demons engaged each other -- bar brawl style! Mako skidded to a halt outside the door and stared in wide-eyed disbelief at the spectacle that followed. One was smashed into a wall; the other butted heads. One landed a right hook, which left him open for an uppercut from the other. One managed a head lock, while the other retaliated with sharp elbows to the gut. Shiaki screamed and scurried out of the way when one almost threw the other right on top of her. His body smashed into one of the marble tables instead. She went immediately to Mako and threw her arms around the human girl -- the most comforting sight available to her. Mako was astounded... was /she/ what this was all about? She removed her long- vest and wrapped it around Shiaki, then cradled the frightened girl. Zenki paused between punches to look back at Mako and Shiaki. "TAKE HER OUT OF HERE!" he commanded. For Zenki's momentary diversion, Goki smarted him a right cross. Zenki's attention returned to the fight, and his knee nearly broke Goki in half. "Awesome..." Mako marveled, before obediantly leading Shiaki away. ******** Roh returned to his quarters, tired and a little distant. He left Ayako in the prison -- he needed time away from her to think. She was human and a Tradi. She would die of old age before the war ended. Was it worth giving up his ideal to be with her for such a brief time? He could have any Neon woman he wanted. Perhaps it was time for 'Ayako' to switch sides. It wouldn't matter to her in the long run, because she wouldn't be around /that/ long anyway. Roh needed to have her while she was still alive -- and still young. Kokutei padded in casually, casting his gaze on Roh, not removing it once as he crossed the room, leapt onto the bed, and laid his head to rest on his overlapping paws. Even in a state of contemplation, Roh couldn't help noticing that he was being stared at. "What is it, Kokutei?" he asked gently. "Your bitch," the wolf replied. When Kokutei spoke, it was to no one but Roh. His voice was deep like an ocean and smooth as velvet. His words came out slowly and clearly, like those of a wise and agéd elder. "Sayaka?" "Her name is 'Ayako,' if I'm not mistaken." Roh frowned. "You can smell her as well as I, you can see her as well as I -- probably twice as well. You know who she is." "Yes. I smell her and see her; better than you, it seems." "What is that supposed to mean?" "You're fucking a shell." Roh rose to his feet angrily. "How many millions of humans," Kokutei continued unabashed, "do you suppose will pass before one's shell is repeated? How many different creatures can be created before some start to appear the same as those which are gone, Inugami?" Kokutei was the only one who still called him by that old name. That name which Roh gave himself, for lack of a true family name to take. That title which meant "God of the Dogs." It was a name he'd grown to hate. Roh went to Kokutei and gripped the scruff of his neck with a threatening harshness. "You're only jealous," Roh hissed. "I do not wish to have any advice from you on this matter." "But how could I be jealous?" the wolf laughed up to him. "You have just treated her with the same contempt Zenki shows to his blue comrade! You have taken what you wanted from her, and left her lying naked in the cold! Do you not realize that a frail human body can die under those conditions?" Roh was dumbstruck. He hadn't realized... Kokutei stopped his laughter and lowered his voice. "You feel no love for Ayako. Not like you felt for Sayaka. I have no reason to be jealous. I merely mock you like the fool that you are." Roh's grip became tighter as he snarled down at Kokutei. ******** "Can I ask you something?" Mako queried while Shiaki pulled clothing on behind a free-standing screen. "Sure..." "What was that all about? Do you know?" "... Not really." Mako sighed. "I think Zenki likes you." Shiaki choked. //WHAT??// Mako waited patiently for the coughing fit to end before she continued. "And I don't mean, like, how he likes Goki and the Commander -- because he doesn't really, I don't think. And not, like, how he likes some of the girls who go into his chamber at midnight -- because he was totally disinterested when one of them was killed for treason last week. I think he really likes you. Did you see when he banged Goki's head against the wall /four times/?!" Shiaki poked her head around from behind the screen. "You missed the first punch. Right in the other one's jaw." She frowned and disappeared behind the screen again. Mako laughed out loud. "You're so cute!" She was sixteen, like Shiaki, and human. By her garb it was obvious that she was a medium. Her clothing was ancient Shinto style, light fabric and color to maintain ethereal equilibrium, but Mako had jazzed hers up a bit. She wore a tough leather longvest over her dress, decorated with all manner of symbols and lined with iron studs. She claimed it acted as a psychic shield, but no one believed her -- her powers as a medium were, to put it lightly, PATHETIC. "If that's true... then why are you a medium?" Shiaki found Mako's personality to be completely unintimidating. She was open and friendly, and maybe just a little naughty. "Well, I can't say whether or not this is true, but the legend goes that I'm part demon," Mako explained. "Two hundred years ago, my ancestor was raped by Zenki." "Two hundred years ago...?" Shiaki immediately recalled Goki's tale of Chiaki. He had said she'd died two hundred years ago -- that would mean these things happened around the same time. "Yup. Shortly after that, my ancestor married her high school sweetheart. Now, here's where my genealogy comes into question. It's for sure that I've got /some/ demon blood, but no one can say how much. My ancestor's husband had been possessed by a lower-level demon in high school, which Zenki killed later. But some of that demon energy could have hung around its host for a while, trying to possess him again. When Zenki banishes a demon, though -- wow, you should see it! -- no demon has the power to possess a body for a thousand more years!" "Really?" Shiaki had never heard of a demon that banished other demons... It sounded rather self-defeating to the Neon cause. "Well, that's what I've heard. So, yah, anyway, my ancestor had her baby, but you know how things were back then. You didn't admit to having a demon baby -- socially frowned upon and whatever. So they said the baby was the husband's. But it might have been Zenki's, too. Either way, there was a demon involved. I think it must have been Zenki's, though, because for several generations my family produced the strongest mediums in all of Japan." "That's pretty amazing," Shiaki admitted. Mako began to mutter to herself, trying to reason something out. "I don't know if they were stronger than the Enno line, because that died out before my ancestor, the demon baby, was born... but I suppose that /would/ make them the strongest since the Enno's weren't there any more..." "Hm?" She made her voice clearly audible again. "Not that any of it matters any more, because the demon blood has been thinned out with each new generation. I think I'm squeezing the last drop, here. They only keep me around for the novelty of the legend -- of course, Zenki isn't too fond of it, but everyone else likes the idea that the mightiest of demon lords did reproduce at one point, and like I said--" "You've said enough," Zenki's voice halted her. He leaned against the door frame wearily and looked around the large room. It was like a barracks, designed to lodge fifty female mediums when they slept at night. Aside from Mako and Shiaki, though, the room was empty at the middle of the day. Looking behind himself, Zenki saw the swarm of concerned and horny females who wanted to congratulate the victor of the fight that ended not ten minutes ago. He stepped into the barracks and slammed the door shut in their faces. They pined outside the door and made unhappy noises, but they were surprisingly easy to ignore. "Hiya, Uncle Zenki!" Mako waved. Zenki growled. He'd told her before -- a number of times -- not to call him that. "I was just telling Shiaki how you're my mighty ancestor, and --" "Shut up, Girl. No one's interested." "I'm interested," Shiaki spoke up from behind the screen. "Exactly," Zenki shot back, "No one." A boot came flying over the screen and smacked Zenki right in his face. He was immediately indignant. "GODDAMNIT, SHIAKI, WHADDYA THINK YER DOIN', HUH?! I'M IN FUCKIN' PAIN OVER HERE, YA STUPID BITCH!!" Mako's eyes went wide. She'd never heard Zenki admit to being in pain before. He /really/ must have wanted Shiaki's attention... /badly!/ "Aww... I'll kiss it and make it better," Mako offered, half- jokingly. She stood on the opposite side of the bunk where Zenki sat, facing his back, stroking his neck in that seductive way she'd seen his 'midnight girls' do. Zenki gave her a look to wither grass, and that was enough to end the joke. Mako knew he'd throw her right out into the hall with all the other girls if it suited him to do so. "Mako, could you please bring the shoe back to me?" Shiaki requested. "Get it yourself, Tradi." Mako suddenly turned cold. "Last I recalled, I wasn't the one who was a prison bitch here." She stuck her nose in the air and trotted to the other end of the room to pretend she was cleaning something. "Yah," Zenki snarled behind Mako's back, just loudly enough for her to hear, "you're the one who cleans up after everyone else 'cause you haven't got any fuckin' power -- just a pathetic legend, if it can be called that." Mako did not respond, and Zenki did not turn to see her expression. All he needed to know was that he'd won -- and it was obvious that he had. Shiaki came out from behind the screen. She was wearing a set of Mako's 'altered' clothes -- tight-fitting, tough leather material with similar symbols and studs -- and only one boot. She approached Zenki slowly. He looked horrible -- Goki was nearly as tough as he was, and it showed in his battered face, and in the places on his clothes where red fluid had seeped through to the surface. Shiaki regretted throwing her boot at him. He watched her without breaking his stare. She knelt down in front of him to re-collect her boot, and he surprised her by snatching it up, without moving from his seat, just before she had the chance. His look remained entirely serious as he held it out in offering to her, and, as she stood and was about to claim it from him, he pulled it away again. Shiaki gave him a questioning look. She leaned forward slightly to reach for where he now held it, and at the last moment, he pulled it back again. This exercise was repeated a third time. He allowed Shiaki to grab the boot, but then he pulled it even further back which pulled her closer to him. She gasped, and barely managed to keep her footing, her face inches from his. "Next time," he uttered, low and gutteral, "you call my name." "What?" she breathed, still holding the boot which he held away, still inches from him. He lifted his free hand and cupped her chin gently. "Next time something happens, don't just scream. Call my name. I'll come much sooner." It took her a moment to realize he was no longer holding the boot. She straightened and stepped away, blushing. That's when Mako's voice, mocking offense, rang from the other end of the barrack. "Geez. /Somebody/ needs to get a room." Zenki growled. "Do you NEVER shut up?!" ******** Kokutei laughed again. Roh's grip on the wolf's neck became no less fierce as Kokutei slowly transformed before him. His body changed into one which more matched Roh's. The tuft of hair which Roh held so menacingly became a flowing mane of dark purple locks, set against smooth skin pale as the moon. Kokutei's tail remained, and patches of silken hair were not absent from his shoulders, elbows, wrists, knees, and other joints. His features were sharp, beautiful, and fierce -- his eyes reflected stars which could not been seen. Roh released him. "I will not be your amusement," he asserted, looking away. "I never considered you as such." Kokutei's voice was more human now. It lacked the element of superiority which was present when he spoke as the wise wolf. "I did not choose you and follow you this far because you amused me, Inugami." "Do not call me that." "Do you prefer 'Master'?" "I prefer you revert immediately. I prefer not to be judged." "I do not judge you. You are my friend -- thus I accept you, and thus I protect you." "'Protect' me? Why /did/ you choose me?" Roh was beginnging to sound bitter. Kokutei smiled, a sincere smile which showed that both his fangs were still intact. "Because, /Inugami/, you are my God." Kokutei sealed that thought with a deep, bestial kiss. TO BE CONTINUED...