Archive of Our Own

Zenitsu decided within twelve minutes of arriving at the communal estate that you were either going to die horribly or get him killed in the process somehow.

Possibly both.

He didn’t even know your name yet!

It had been raining. Not heavily, not enough to flood the garden or turn the courtyard of the main compound to sludge, but enough to make the entire estate smell damp and alive. Wet cedar. Wet dirt. Wet tatami. Cold rain that settled into clothes and stayed there no matter how hard you wrung the sleeves out afterward. The estate had been loud in that restless evening sort of way, slayers drifting in after patrol with muddy hems and tired shoulders, someone laughing too hard in the daidokoro, swords being cleaned beneath lanternlight while crows screamed from roof tiles like the world was ending specifically for attention. Zenitsu had been trying very hard not to cry over the fact that Iguro-san himself had apparently decided to oversee portions of training rotation that month, because frankly there were easier ways to die than under the gaze of the Serpent Hashira.

And then someone had landed directly in front of him from the roof.

Zenitsu screamed.

You blinked at him from where you’d landed in a crouch on the engawa rail, balanced with impossible casualness despite the rain slicking the wood beneath your sandals. Water dripped steadily from your hair onto your shoulders. Your haori hung half open. There was dried blood beneath one side of your jaw, old enough to have turned rust-brown instead of red.

“Jesus Christ,” you said.

“DON’T DROP FROM THE SKY LIKE THAT.”

“You sounded close enough to dying already that I figured it wouldn’t matter.”

“WHAT DOES THAT MEAN???”

You looked him over then with the strange sharpness Zenitsu would later realize you applied to everybody. Not judgmental exactly, but too ambiguous to really pin down. You were smiling, but only with half your mouth, and the blood under your jaw made the expression feel oddly feral in the lanternlight.

“How do you know who I am,” Zenitsu demanded weakly.

“You scream a lot.”

Then you had hopped backward onto the roof again before he could respond.

Just straight backward.

Like gravity was optional for you specifically.

Zenitsu stared upward in horror. “What is WRONG with you?!”

Your face appeared upside down over the edge of the roof a second later, hair hanging toward the courtyard while rainwater slid off your nose.

“A lot of things, probably."

And then you vanished again.

.

.

.

Rumors about you spread strangely through the estate.

The Corps was full of dramatic people. Tengen existed. Inosuke existed. Half the Hashira felt less like functioning human beings and more like natural disasters waiting to happen that somebody had thought it was a good idea to hand swords to. But nobody seemed capable of describing you consistently, which somehow unsettled Zenitsu more than if they’d all agreed you were insane.

One slayer called you kind.

Another called you unsettling.

Someone else swore they’d seen you laughing hysterically while resetting a dislocated shoulder yourself after patrol, teeth bared and eyes watering from pain while you told somebody nearby to stop looking so pale because “it’s literally still attached, calm down.”

One Kakushi said you always carried extra bandages.

Mitsuri-san adored you almost immediately.

Shinobu-san watched you with the same expression she used around suspicious medicine bottles.

And Iguro-san–Zenitsu still didn’t understand that one–hated everyone.

Not loudly, usually. That was Shinazugawa-san’s department. Iguro-san’s hatred was colder than that. He looked at most people like they were inconveniences he tolerated purely because Kagaya-sama asked him to. Training under him was awful in ways that stopped being funny after the second day.

Not exaggerated awful, and for once, not Zenitsu-being-dramatic awful. Zenitsu knew he was a crybaby in the Corps–but how can one be faced with LITERAL SPIDER MONSTERS THAT EAT PEOPLE AND NOT REACT–but he had heard enough of the other slayers dreading Iguro-san’s station that he knew that this was not an instance of himself being lazy, but rather something actually awful.

Like, c’mon, he used real blades. Like, not even practice swords not broken in or molded to anyone. No. He made you use YOUR OWN SWORD, the one basically an extension of your arm. 

Live movement drills, where they’d all be swinging in a line, and he’d walk up behind you and swing at you and then you’d have to dodge or get skewered.

Lower rank slayers used as moving obstacles while others sparred.

“You hesitate because you’re afraid of hurting each other,” Iguro-san had said once while three slayers bled onto the dirt behind him. “That hesitation gets people killed.”

Nobody argued with him because nobody wanted to survive that experience twice.

Zenitsu had spent the first three days convinced the Serpent Hashira was eventually going to carve disappointment directly into his spine.

Then you showed up late.

Not barely late, which would already be a death sentence in itself. No, you were visibly late, like FAR past the point where you could slip into line and claim you’d been there the whole time (which was a mystery in itself, why was a Hashira participating in ranked drills?). Hair still mussed from sleep, haori hanging halfway off one shoulder, carrying somebody else’s forgotten lunch box beneath one arm while chewing absentmindedly on what looked suspiciously like stolen pickled radish.

Iguro-san looked at you.

You looked at Iguro-san.

And then, impossibly, you grinned.

“Morning.”

“You’re late.”

“Was asleep.”

“I gathered that from your obvious lack of dignity.”

“You noticed me? I’m flattered.”

Zenitsu waited for your impending death. You’d be the next one strapped to a pole and swung at, he was SURE of it. Instead, something strange happened.

Iguro-san’s mouth twitched beneath the bandages.

Not fully. Barely enough to qualify as movement at all. But something in his face shifted with microscopic subtlety and suddenly the entire training yard felt wrong in a way Zenitsu couldn’t explain. Alive differently. Like the pressure in the air before lightning splits a tree in half.

“You’re holding someone’s lunch,” Iguro-san said.

“They forgot it.”

“You stole it.”

“I borrowed it aggressively.”

“You’re unbelievable.”

“And yet here I remain.”

Then you bowed.

Not lazily, your arms snapped to your side with a smack against your sides, and not mockingly. You were genuinely addressing him with respect, areal bow.

And after a beat, Iguro-san bowed back.

Zenitsu nearly passed out.

.

.

.

It got worse from there.

Much worse.

Because once Zenitsu noticed it, he couldn’t stop noticing it.

The way you moved around each other.

Not soft, and that was the terrifying part.

If anything, Iguro-san seemed meaner toward you than everyone else during sparring. Sharper. Faster. His strikes came frighteningly close during practice fights, wooden sword cracking against both of yours hard enough to bruise through muscle while dust kicked up around your feet in violent bursts. But you never looked afraid.

You looked alive.

That was the part Zenitsu hated most.

You laughed during fights.

Not constantly, and not idiotically, not in the surefire way, cocky and certain you’d win, the way demons were, but sometimes Iguro-san would force you backward across the courtyard so quickly your sandals tore grooves into the dirt and you would grin like you were having the time of your life, chest heaving, eyes bright in a way that made Zenitsu deeply concerned for your psychological wellbeing.

And even worse, Iguro-san looked the same. He wasn’t smiling, not exactly, not that Zenitsu would be able to see it anyway, but his bicolor eyes were bright and awake. It was like something inside him sharpened into focus whenever you stepped into range.

The other slayers noticed it too. Zenitsu knew they did. You could feel it during training sometimes, everybody trying very hard not to stare while pretending they weren’t witnessing something deeply bizarre unfolding directly in front of them.

Because Iguro-san was terrifying with everyone else.

Cold corrections, brutal efficiency, and of course, no softness or allowance whatsoever.

But with you, it wasn’t softness still, in fact, Zenitsu didn’t know if Iguro-san was CAPABLE of softness, and he also couldn’t exactly picture him going home to somebody, NOT THAT HE WANTED TO THINK ABOUT THAT, BECAUSE HOW COULD SOMEONE LIKE HIM FIND LOVE IF SOMEONE KIND LIKE ZENITSU COULDN’T?

It was attention, the kind that bordered on hunger.

Iguro-san watched your footing before attacks landed. Adjusted angles mid-fight to compensate for your bad shoulder whenever old injuries acted up. Knew exactly how far he could push before your body started compensating dangerously. Knew exactly when you were bluffing exhaustion and exactly when your legs were actually beginning to fail beneath you.

And you CLEARLY trusted him, for some fucking reason. That was the truly insane part.

Zenitsu could hear it, in breathing rhythms. Footwork. The complete absence of hesitation.

You fought like someone dangling from a rooftop by one hand while fully convinced the person holding your wrist would never let go.

.

.

.

The rainstorm arrived three weeks later.

Not thunder, thankfully. Just violent rain hammering the estate hard enough to drown conversation beneath it. Most slayers stayed inside, gathered near lanternlight and warmth while steam rose from drying uniforms draped near the fire.

You did not, because of course you didn’t.

Zenitsu spotted you through the shoji doors halfway up the tiled roof above the engawa, balancing near the edge with your arms spread slightly for balance while rain soaked straight through your uniform. Your silhouette cut dark against the storm clouds, careless in a way that made Zenitsu’s stomach hurt to look at.

“What is he DOING,” Zenitsu whispered in horror.

Inosuke looked up from where he was trying to eat six rice balls simultaneously.

“Being weird.”

“That’s NOT NORMAL.”

“None of us are normal.”

“That doesn’t mean you should stand on roofs during storms!”

You crouched suddenly, peering over the roof edge toward the courtyard below.

A familiar snake was coiled around one of the support beams beneath you.

Then Iguro-san stepped into the rain.

No umbrella, and no rush to pull you down, the crazy bastard. All of a sudden, Zenitsu had the horrifying thought of:

What if Iguro-san was just biding his time and waiting for you to kill yourself doing something stupid? What if this was all a long game he was playing so he didn’t have to get his hands dirty?

From inside the estate, framed by lanternlight and storm-dark wood, the scene looked unreal somehow. Like one of those strange painted screens rich people hung in reception rooms. Something too intimate to stare at directly.

You said something that even Zenitsu couldn’t hear.

Iguro-san answered.

Then you laughed, and it was a weird laugh, the kind of laugh people only made when they forgot to guard themselves for a second.

Iguro-san tilted his face upward slightly in that tiny almost-smile again. Like the sight of you balanced dangerously above a thirty foot drop in the middle of a storm was somehow enough to soften the sharpest man Zenitsu had ever met.

“You are all clinically insane,” Zenitsu muttered weakly.

Then your foot slipped.

Barely, but Zenitsu felt his entire soul leave his body. He was too far away to catch you and Iguro-san probably wouldn’t even try, given that you were considerably taller and more solid than he was. If he had to take a guess, he’d have to say Iguro-san was around 162 centimeters, and the jury was utterly out on you because you rarely sat still long enough to really get an estimate, but Zenitsu would take a WILD guess and estimate you at 181 centimeters. 

You caught yourself immediately, crouching lower against the slick tile, and below you, Iguro-san moved, fast enough that Zenitsu almost missed it.

One sharp step forward.

Shoulders tense.

Fear.

Real fear.

It vanished from his face almost immediately, swallowed back down into that controlled stillness he wore like armor, but Zenitsu had seen it.

Just for a second.

And suddenly something cold and strange settled into his stomach.

Because that expression had not looked like annoyance.

Or irritation.

It had looked exactly like the moment before somebody realizes they have something to lose.

. . .

Mitsuri thought you looked lonely the first time she saw you.

Not alone.

Lonely.

There was a difference between those things, she thought. Alone was physical. Alone was somebody sitting by themselves during dinner or walking patrol without a partner because assignments got shuffled strangely that week. Lonely was quieter than that. Lonely settled into people’s posture and lived in the way they lingered near noise without joining it fully.

The communal estate had been loud that evening, every engawa and room crowded with slayers cleaning swords or eating or trying unsuccessfully to stay awake after patrol. Lanternlight glowed soft gold through shoji paper while summer cicadas screamed from the trees hard enough to swallow half the conversations in the courtyard whole. Somebody had stolen sweet potatoes from the daidokoro again. That kid with the boar head, Inosuke was yelling about murder. Zenitsu sounded one inconvenience away from openly sobbing. Younger slayers sat shoulder-to-shoulder while they ate, exhausted enough that their heads occasionally knocked together mid-conversation.

And in the middle of all that life, all that warmth, all that noise, you sat alone on the outer edge of the roof.

Not the walkway itself.

Like actually on the roof.

Balanced cross-legged where the wood sloped downward toward the garden stones below, one sword laid across your lap while the other rested against your shoulder. Your sandals sat abandoned beside the open window behind you. Mitsuri remembered staring at them first because it felt strangely intimate somehow, seeing somebody’s shoes discarded carelessly like they intended to stay awhile. Like they had settled there between one heartbeat and the next without meaning to.

You were cleaning blood from the grooves near the tsuba with the concentration of someone performing surgery.

Demon blood stained differently. Mitsuri knew the look and smell of it by now.

The strange thing was that you kept glancing back toward the estate while you worked. Not enough to seem distracted, just often enough that she noticed. Some part of you refused to fully turn your back on the sound of other people existing nearby. She had almost called out to you then.

Almost.

But Shinobu touched her wrist lightly before she could.

“Leave him a minute,” she murmured.

“You know him?”

“A little.”

Mitsuri looked back toward the roof.

You had paused mid-motion, cloth wrapped around one blade while your attention drifted toward the courtyard below where a handful of younger slayers were sparring beneath lanternlight. One of them stumbled. Another immediately reached out to steady him before he hit the dirt.

Your mouth softened.

And suddenly Mitsuri understood.

Ah, she thought quietly.

There you are.

.

.

.

Mitsuri liked you quickly.

This was not unusual. Mitsuri liked most people quickly. Love came easily to her. That was not weakness no matter what anybody said. The world was frightening enough already, if she found something worth caring for, she refused to do it halfway.

And you…

Well.

You made it easy sometimes.

You carried injured slayers without complaining even when you were limping worse than the people you were helping. You remembered names. Tiny details. Favorite foods. Which recruits got nervous before missions and which ones got quiet instead. You sat with younger slayers before patrol and talked until their hands stopped shaking around their rice bowls. You let Kakushi braid pieces of your hair while waiting for Shinobu to stitch your shoulder because “if I move she’ll stab me on purpose.” You climbed trees to retrieve crows tangled in branches. You once spent almost an hour helping a child search for a missing cat during patrol instead of immediately returning to the estate afterward.

You looked at people with genuine warmth, but out of all the people you did, only one truly hurt Mitsuri in a way that she couldn’t figure out.

You had looked at Obanai with this awful fondness hidden beneath your grin that made something warm bloom painfully behind Mitsuri’s ribs.

Because she loved Obanai, not in the way people assumed, not because she thought he would marry her one day or hold her hand beneath blooming wisteria trees or look at her the way girls in stories were supposed to be looked at.

No.

Mitsuri loved him because he was kind to her in a way the world rarely had been.

Because he listened to her, because he saw her as a person before he saw her as strange or an object. More lecherous men had seen her uniform and the way it was cut and decided her personality before she had even spoke, and he had never once done that, but he also hadn’t tried to cover her up either, and she was grateful for that. He never looked frightened of her strength either. A strong woman in the Corps wasn’t unusual, there were many female slayers, but because of Mitsuri’s past, she had learned to be ashamed of her appetite and her strength.

Somewhere beneath all his sharpness and fury and scar tissue, Obanai carried fear around women so profound it felt carved directly into his bones, and Mitsuri had realized slowly over time that every act of gentleness he offered her was deliberate. Chosen carefully. Trembling slightly beneath the surface.

He trusted her.

Obanai was kind to her.

Painfully, earnestly kind.

He made sure she ate enough during meetings. Walked beside her after gatherings even when he pretended he was “already headed that direction.” Left small gifts wordlessly outside her room. Pickled plums. Hair ribbons. The green socks she wore now, with promise to replace them if they tore or were stained or ruined. Once, a pressed flower tucked carefully between the pages of a book she’d mentioned liking weeks earlier.

But he was careful with her too.

Always careful, every word passing through his teeth first before he allowed it into the world, every expression restrained before it fully formed.

He was afraid of taking up too much space around her and that had been clear from day one.

Mitsuri had spent a long time thinking maybe that was simply the shape of Obanai’s affection. Quiet and hesitant in the way wounded things often were.

Then she met you.

And slowly, terribly, she realized the difference.

Around her, Obanai watched himself.

Around you, he forgot to.

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.

.

The first time Mitsuri noticed it clearly was during dinner.

It wasn’t anything out of place or dramatic, had she not known the type of person Obanai was, or the sort of type of person that you were, and the worst part was that she knew both of those things and what you both were like, and she had to know that this wasn’t normal.

The communal estate had settled into that sleepy warmth that followed long patrol days. Lanternlight flickered low while slayers crowded shoulder-to-shoulder around the cha-no-ma with bowls balanced in their laps, too tired to care about personal space anymore. Someone near the back was already asleep upright against the wall.

You sat beside Obanai.

Mitsuri sat across from him.

At some point during the meal, you reached over without looking and stole a piece of grilled fish directly off Obanai’s plate.

Mitsuri froze a little, waiting for the shutdown, or worse, the outburst, because Obanai hated when people touched his food. Not disliked in the way where his face would shrivel and he’d look at the perpetrator with an air of disgust, no. Hated. Mitsuri suspected faintly that it was something to do with his past and his habit of food hoarding. One slayer had brushed his chopsticks accidentally months earlier and looked about ready to publish his last will and testament. 

You stole food off his plate like it was breathing.

“You’re unbelievable,” Obanai muttered.

“You love me.”

Zenitsu inhaled rice directly into his lungs from two cushions over and Mitsuri nearly did the same. Zenitsu reacted at the words, but Mitsuri reacted to what came after the words. 

The thing was that Obanai reacted immediately instead of withdrawing into himself first. There was no wall sliding carefully into place, no hesitation, and maybe most importantly, no screaming or threats. 

He reached over, grabbed the back of your haori, and yanked you backward hard enough that you nearly tipped sideways off the zabuton entirely while laughing.

“Steal your own food.”

“You have better food.”

“You took it before tasting yours.”

“Instinct.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“Yet here I thrive.”

Obanai rolled his eyes so quickly and naturally that Mitsuri felt something inside her chest ache softly, because he looked comfortable for once. His guard was down and he was freely reacting positively to you.

Comfortable.

The realization hurt in a strange gentle way. Not enough to resent. Never that. Just enough to ache like pressing carefully on a bruise.

Because Obanai loved her. She knew he did.

But around her, he was always aware of himself.

Around you, he simply existed.

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.

.

The first time Mitsuri saw the two of you fight together, she understood fully.

The mission itself should not have been difficult. A weaker demon haunting mountain pathways, nothing resembling a Lower Moon, but slightly stronger than the strongest demon on the Final Selection mountain. Mostly the sort of assignment given to younger slayers needing experience while Hashira supervised nearby in case things deteriorated unexpectedly.

Mitsuri spent most of the evening watching the recruits instead, the ones held back at first to let the first round of slayers attempt to fight the demon first.

Watching panic and courage wrestle visibly behind their eyes. Watching them breathe too hard before engagements. Watching them learn. Mitsuri loved watching slayers survive long enough to become less frightened versions of themselves.

You stood nearby while they fought, balanced lightly atop a stone wall with both swords crossed behind your neck. Every time one of the younger slayers stumbled, your posture shifted before they recovered. Every near miss made your grip tighten fractionally around one hilt.

Watching every lover on the battleground.

That was what it felt like. Not in a romantic way, Mitsuri was of the firm belief that you could refer to anything or anyone as a lover without it taking on the specific meaning that places full of scandal and rot like the red light districts meant it. No, something broader than that, something aching and deeply human.

You looked at younger slayers the way older brothers looked at children trying too hard to become adults overnight.

Then the demon adapted out of sheer desperation. Its body twisted suddenly toward one of the recruits nearest the treeline, abandoning defense entirely in favor of speed ugly enough to make Mitsuri move before thinking.

Only she never reached the boy.

Because two figures got there first.

You dropped from the wall at the exact same moment Obanai burst through the trees.

Where the atmosphere had previously been encouragement attempts and motivation, it was now just the realization that this was outside the younger slayers’ skillsets for now, and that this was a mistake on the Hashira’s part, not a shortcoming of the recruits. 

Mitsuri stopped moving. She realized instantly that interrupting would only get in the way.

The demon lunged, and Obanai redirected seamlessly. 

One slash curved like a coiling serpent, forcing the creature sideways instead of backward.

Directly toward you.

Your first blade caught beneath its jaw, and the second followed half a second later, removing both arms before the body fully registered the first strike.

Too fast.

Far too fast.

The younger slayers stared openly. Mitsuri did too, as a matter of fact. The children–because that’s truly all they were, children–stared because THIS is what they had to live up to. Mitsuri stared because this was the utmost unspoken trust. 

The synchronization was almost frightening.

You moved around each other with terrifying certainty, both bodies adjusting in real time without hesitation or verbal communication. Obanai’s strikes carved pathways through the demon’s movement while yours occupied those openings before they fully existed. One blade trapped. The other killed.

Like watching two halves of the same thought unfold simultaneously. The worst part was the expressions on your faces.

You were grinning.

Obanai looked calm in that awful sharp way he only ever did during combat.

But beneath it, Mitsuri saw it.

Joy.

Not cruelty or bloodlust, but the strongest sense of trust she’d seen in the Corps between two members. Complete trust that the other person would follow behind you and not let you down, the kind born from knowing exactly how another person moves. Knowing where they will step before they do. Knowing how close danger can come before it becomes real.

The demon died quickly after that. The clearing fell silent except for heavy breathing and cicadas.

One of the younger slayers whispered, “Holy shit.”

Then you laughed.

Bright and breathless and a little wild around the edges while flicking blood from one sword.

“You cut that one too close.”

Obanai sheathed his blade smoothly.

“You compensated late.”

“You still caught it.”

“You assumed I would.”

“You did.”

The eye contact afterward lasted less than two seconds and Mitsuri felt like she had witnessed something intimate enough to apologize for seeing.

Because suddenly the shape of it became horribly obvious.

Obanai trusted her.

Loved her deeply in the quiet careful way frightened people sometimes love the first person who teaches them they are safe.

But you…

You were where he rested the parts of himself he no longer wanted to hold alone.

. . .

Obanai noticed you long before he spoke to you.

That irritated him more than he liked admitting.

People assumed he observed everything equally because he was quiet, because Kaburamaru saw what he missed, because his attention cut through rooms like a blade, but the truth was simpler and far more annoying: Obanai ignored most people intentionally. Easier to move through the world when human beings became shapes instead of individuals. Voices instead of personalities. Most people exhausted him before they even opened their mouths.

You kept forcing yourself into his awareness anyway. The first thing he noticed was movement.

You climbed things constantly.

Roofs. Trees. Courtyard walls. Support beams. Obanai had once found you asleep halfway up the outer estate wall with one arm hanging loose toward the dirt below like you had simply collapsed there mid-thought. Another time he stepped outside before dawn and spotted you balancing barefoot along the ridge of the tiled roof while fog still clung low over the garden stones.

“You’re going to break your neck,” he’d called upward.

You looked down at him upside down from where you hung partially over the roof edge.

“That sounds like future me’s problem.”

“You make everything everyone else’s problem.”

“You noticed? I’m touched.”

Then you’d grinned and disappeared back over the roofline before he could decide whether to continue the conversation or kill you.

Kaburamaru liked you almost immediately.

That was the second irritating thing.

Traitorous animal.

The snake took to winding around your wrists while you cleaned your swords on the garden wall at night, scales warm beneath your fingers while you spoke to him with the same absentminded cadence people used with old friends. You never flinched when he moved suddenly, never reached too fast, and above all, never treated him like decoration.

Obanai hated how carefully he noticed that.

Hated how quickly Kaburamaru started searching for you in crowded rooms.

Worse, you fed him scraps when you thought nobody was looking.

“You’re encouraging bad behavior,” Obanai said once.

Kaburamaru was half asleep around your shoulders while you sat cross-legged on the engawa outside the cha-no-ma, rainwater dripping steadily from your damp hair onto the wood beneath you.

Without opening your eyes, you replied, “Funny. He says the same thing about you.”

Obanai should have walked away.

Instead, he sat down beside you.

That irritated him most of all.

.

.

.

You fought like something with too many teeth.

Not sloppy.

Never sloppy.

That was what separated you from Shinazugawa. Sanemi fought like violence incarnate, all overwhelming force and fury sharpened into a weapon. Your fighting style felt different. Wilder in a quieter way. Two swords flashing through combat with fluid unpredictability while your body bent around attacks instead of meeting them directly.

Watching you spar made Obanai feel vaguely murderous.

Not toward you.

Toward everyone else.

Because lower rank slayers watched your fights with the same expression people wore standing too close to cliff edges. Fascination overriding survival instinct. You moved beautifully enough that people forgot how dangerous you actually were.

Obanai never forgot.

He saw the recklessness underneath it.

The way you trusted your reflexes too much.

The way you stepped into openings a fraction too narrow because you assumed your body would compensate in time.

The way you smiled during combat.

That last part bothered him the worst.

“You enjoy this too much,” he said after one sparring match.

The courtyard still smelled like rain and disturbed dirt. Your chest rose hard beneath your uniform while blood from a split lip dragged red across your grin.

“You don’t?”

“That isn’t the point.”

“You didn’t answer.”

Obanai adjusted his grip on his sword. You watched him too closely. Always too closely.

Like you were trying to solve him.

It should have made him uncomfortable, but instead it made something restless curl hot beneath his ribs.

“You fight,” Obanai said carefully, “weirdly.”

Your smile faltered. Then you laughed softly through your nose and wiped blood from your mouth with the back of your wrist.

“That’s rich coming from you.”

Obanai said nothing.

Because the infuriating thing was that you were right.

.

.

.

The entertainment district made him understand the problem fully.

Crowded streets always put him in a foul mood. Too loud. Too many bodies packed too close together. Too many smells layered over each other until the air itself felt dirty. Lanternlight reflected gold and red against rain-slick stone while voices spilled from open storefronts and brothels in overlapping waves loud enough to make his temples ache.

You loved it. Well, not the brothel part, you’d made it crystal clear that you despised the practice of making women sell their bodies as a form of debt repayment. But you loved the city and the bustle, because of course you did.

Of course you did.

Obanai watched you disappear into crowds with alarming ease, moving through people like flowing water while somehow continuing conversations over your shoulder without losing track of where he walked behind you.

You greeted street vendors like old friends.

Stopped to help an elderly man gather spilled oranges after somebody knocked his basket sideways.

Bought grilled dumplings from a stall and immediately handed half to a group of children lingering nearby.

Then, twenty minutes later, killed a demon in an alley so quickly the blood had barely finished hitting the wall before you were wiping your swords clean again. Kindness and violence occupied neighboring rooms inside you, and that confused the FUCK out of Obanai. 

Obanai stood at the mouth of the alley watching rainwater dilute demon blood into thin pink streams that disappeared between cracks in the stone. Your sleeves were splattered dark red almost to the elbow.

Lanternlight caught along the edges of your blades while distant music drifted faintly from somewhere deeper in the district.

“You’re staring,” you said without looking up.

“You’re reckless.”

“You say that every time I do something that isn’t walking on solid ground.”

“You continue deserving it.”

That grin again. Sharp, alive and so very bright and warm. Ergo, awful for him.

“You worried about me, Iguro?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

Obanai should have denied it again, instead he found himself watching blood slide slowly down your wrist toward your fingertips.

You hadn’t noticed the cut yet, or maybe you had and simply didn’t care. That was the problem with you, you moved through the world like somebody starving for it. For noise. For people. For fighting. For connection. For proof that you were alive enough to touch things and be touched back. You lingered in crowded rooms long after conversations ended. Stayed awake on the engawa or the roof listening to other slayers breathe through thin shoji walls. Collected people around yourself without seeming to realize you were doing it.

Hunting for love. The realization landed inside Obanai ugly and immediate.

Not romantic love specifically.

Something broader, with more definition than just intimacy. You wanted closeness with the same frightening intensity you brought to combat.

Combat was where you looked happiest. Killing for pleasure in the sense that you felt like with each demon you murdered you made the world a little better of a place. Obanai understood that too well to judge it properly.

The world sharpened during battle. Became simpler. Cleaner. Your body stopped belonging entirely to you and transformed into movement and instinct and survival. There was relief in that sometimes, relief in becoming a weapon instead of a person.

You laughed during it, not because you enjoyed suffering, exactly, but the adrenaline buildup over time does things to a person, and fighting seemed to make you feel alive enough to stop searching for a futile thing for a few minutes.

Lost in a concrete jungle of the district, Obanai leaned his shoulder silently against the alley wall beside you while rainwater hissed softly against distant lantern flames.

You glanced sideways at him.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“You’re doing the thing again.”

“What thing.”

“The thinking thing.”

“You say that like it’s uncommon.”

“It usually means you’re about to insult me or threaten violence.”

“I can do both simultaneously.”

“There he is.”

You bumped your shoulder lightly against his, a casual, thoughtless motion, but Obanai felt the warmth of your skin, even through both of your uniforms and haoris. That was another thing, he thought distantly. You always ran FREAKISHLY warm, to the point Shinobu had long since stopped being concerned that you were sick unless you actively went to her and told her so because of the time spent fussing over you only to find out that was your baseline.

But you were warm, and warm skin meant that you were alive. Obanai felt something in his chest pull painfully tight, because he understood suddenly, with terrifying clarity, that you had crawled beneath his guard so gradually he hadn’t noticed until it was far too late to remove you.

And the worst part is that some ugly starving part of him no longer wanted to try.

. . .

Genya first saw you fighting in the middle of winter.

Not properly fighting, actually, just parrying blows and laughing.

That was what stuck with him.

Snow had fallen hard enough overnight that the entire communal estate looked quieter than usual beneath it, roofs gone soft and white while weak morning light reflected painfully bright off the courtyard stones. Most slayers stayed inside when weather turned like that. Old injuries stiffened in the cold. Shoulders locked up. Fingers stopped listening properly around sword hilts. Even breathing felt sharp some mornings if the air got cold enough.

You and Iguro-san were sparring anyway.

Of course you were.

Genya stood half-hidden beneath the engawa overhang with his hands shoved deep into his sleeves while the two of you moved through the courtyard like the snow simply wasn’t there. Boots tore tracks through the thin layer of white every time one of you pivoted. Obanai’s sword curved strange and fluid through the air while your dual blades flashed fast enough that sometimes Genya lost track of where one ended and the other began.

Too close.

Everything about the way you fought each other was too close.

One second Iguro-san’s blade was angled toward your throat and the next your body bent around it almost lazily, one sword catching his while the other stopped just short of his ribs before both of you moved again so fast it stopped looking fully human. There was no hesitation anywhere in it. No instinctive flinch people usually had when steel came too near skin.

It was like watching wolves bite at each other for fun, not enemies, something more familiar than that. You kept grinning, and not mockingly or cruelly. You didn’t look like you enjoyed bloodshed or got off on hurting your sparring partners, you just looked alive.

That was the part Genya understood immediately in a way he wished he didn’t, because he knew that feeling.

Knew what it felt like for your body to finally stop feeling wrong during combat. Knew the horrible relief of becoming useful enough that all the noise in your head went quiet for a little while. During fights there were moments where Genya stopped feeling like an awkward thing stitched together wrong. Moments where hunger and fear and shame burned away beneath instinct until all that remained was movement and survival and the clean sharp certainty that at least here, at least now, he knew exactly what he was supposed to do.

You looked like that, like fighting made your skin fit better sometimes.

Genya watched you duck beneath one of Obanai’s strikes with a laugh breathless enough to fog white in the cold air while your second blade locked against his so hard sparks snapped sideways across the courtyard.

Neither of you backed off, and neither of you even looked nervous. Genya couldn’t imagine Iguro-san smiling during sparring if the world depended on it, but his eyes were alight with the same manic laughter yours were, even if he weren’t actually physically laughing. He looked awake. Sharp, but not slayer-training-rotation sharp, like he was about to use lower ranks as bait, sharp in a “I’m actually having the time of my fucking life right now” way. Genya didn’t mean to overstep, even mentally, but it really looked like something inside him uncoiled whenever you stepped close enough to touch.

“Hunting for an animal.”

The thought came suddenly and sat ugly beneath Genya’s ribs afterward, like the two of you had spent your entire lives moving through crowds looking instinctively for something shaped like yourselves. Something equally ruined. Equally restless. Somebody who understood the uglier parts without needing them explained aloud.

Genya hated how much sense that made.

People like you usually ended up alone eventually, those who were deemed too strange for the matchmaker to find a fit, too rough around the edges, full of spark that didn’t quite know if it was a sparkler on New Years or if it was a wildfire just looking for kindling, and especially those who were too hungry for things that weren’t understood in this time, like certain types of intimacy, or a love of fighting, or things outside societal expectations. Yeah, people like you, civilians, tended to live a lonely life, and yet somehow when you fought beside Iguro-san, it stopped looking lonely.

It looked dangerous instead.

.

.

.

Sanemi thought you were fucking insane the first time he watched you jump off a roof.

Not metaphorically or anything. Actually jump off a roof.

The communal estate had been half asleep after a late mission rotation, lanternlight still burning low behind the shoji while exhausted slayers drifted toward sleeping rooms in slow staggering groups. Sanemi had stepped outside because somebody nearby snored like a dying animal and he was considering murder as a valid solution.

Then you appeared overhead.

Not climbing down or using the stairs like a normal human being.

You simply dropped from the roof above the engawa, landed hard enough to crack the wood beneath your sandals, then continued walking immediately while adjusting the swords at your hips like nothing unusual had happened.

Sanemi stared at your back and you turned, feeling eyes on you, and staring back.

“What.”

“You’re gonna break both your legs someday.”

“That sounds expensive.”

“You sound stupid.”

“You sound old.”

Then you kept walking.

Sanemi should’ve hated you immediately.

Honestly, he tried.

You were reckless in ways that made his teeth hurt. Always climbing things. Always taking unnecessary risks during sparring. Smiling after injuries that should have wiped the expression off your face completely. The kind of person who volunteered for ugly patrol routes without hesitation and came back blood-soaked but still somehow carrying extra medicine for somebody else.

It wasn’t bravery, Sanemi knew bravery. This was something stranger.

You moved through the world like somebody who simply did not value his own life correctly, and the thing that bothered him most was that you didn’t seem miserable about it. You reminded him a little bit of Genya and then he immediately cursed himself for even thinking it. 

Most people with death wishes dragged them around visibly. Heavy things. You could see it in their shoulders and heear it in the way they talked. You didn’t seem like that. Of course, maybe those feelings were there, just cleverly hidden, but then again, Sanemi wasn’t one for feelings, he went off of looks alone, and you looked like you were trying to consume as much of being alive as possible before something took it away from you.

Sanemi recognized that too.

That was the problem.

.

.

.

Then there was Iguro.

Fucking Iguro.

Sanemi had known Obanai long enough to understand exactly how weird the situation actually was. Most people only saw the obvious things first: the temper, the insults, and the carriage. The way Iguro carried himself like he expected violence from the world and planned to return it twice over.

Most people also missed the deeper issue entirely, that Obanai did not let people close.

The man barely tolerated existing in crowded rooms half the time. He sat near exits instinctively. Watched everybody too carefully and moved through the world like closeness itself made his skin crawl.

Then suddenly there was you.

Sleeping outside his room after missions, stealing food directly off his plate, touching his shoulder casually while talking without getting your hand bitten off, and worst of all, Iguro reacted to you immediately instead of filtering himself first.

That was what finally convinced Sanemi something was deeply wrong here.

Because around most people, Obanai paused before speaking. Thought through reactions and wrapped every emotion in sharpness before allowing anybody else near it.

Around you, he forgot.

Sanemi noticed it during sparring one afternoon while half the estate watched in half horror, half awe from the shade.

You were bleeding from somewhere near your eyebrow, blood dragging bright down the side of your face while both swords flashed loose through your grip fast enough to whistle through the summer air. Dust kicked up around your feet every time Obanai drove you backward across the courtyard.

“You’re compensating left again,” Iguro snapped.

“You noticed?”

“You fight like an idiot.”

“You say the sweetest things.”

Then you ducked beneath one strike and laughed when Obanai’s follow-up slash missed your shoulder by less than an inch. Like, actually laughed, liike this was fun for you.

Sanemi felt something ugly twist behind his ribs watching it, not because he thought either of you were wrong, but because he understood exactly what he was seeing.

“I become an animal.”

The thought arrived quiet and immediate. Around each other, the two of you got worse.

Whatever instincts normal people had toward self-preservation stopped applying once you were fighting side-by-side. You took risks because somewhere deep down you trusted Iguro would compensate before things turned fatal, and Iguro compensated because somewhere along the line he’d started treating your survival like an instinct instead of a conscious decision.

Dangerous.

Fucking dangerous.

Sanemi watched your blades lock together against Obanai’s with enough force to throw sparks sideways across the courtyard while sweat darkened both your uniforms beneath the afternoon heat.

Neither of you backed off, and neither of you even looked frightened.

“Hunting for an animal.”

Yeah. That was exactly the fucking problem.

Sanemi recognized the expression on Obanai’s face.

He’d worn versions of it himself once or twice before the world taught him better: that awful starving relief of finally finding another person twisted in the exact same direction you were.

It was a fifty-fifty on how that ended. People who could read the other like that, and had such a clear, unspoken bond usually either survived together or died catastrophically trying.

. . .

Gyomei noticed you first by silence.

People misunderstood blindness constantly. They thought perception narrowed when sight disappeared, as though the world became smaller instead of simply rearranged. Gyomei knew the estate more intimately than most sighted people ever would. He knew which engawa boards creaked louder during rainstorms. Which younger slayers dragged exhaustion through their footsteps after difficult patrols. Which recovery rooms smelled faintly of medicinal herbs strong enough to sting the back of the throat before someone inside died.

He knew people through the space they occupied. You changed rooms when you entered them.

Never in the way Uzui did, all bright noise and movement and deliberate attention-seeking. Yours was subtler than that. The atmosphere around you loosened somehow. Conversations stretched longer. People shifted closer together without realizing they were doing it. Even the younger slayers breathed differently near you, slower and less guarded, like some instinct inside them registered safety before their minds caught up.

Gyomei noticed that before he ever properly spoke to you.

He noticed the way the communal estate settled around your presence the same way water settled around stones in a riverbed.

And he noticed, quietly, that you almost never slept alone, not in the way that people assumed when that sentence was spoken.

The Corps was communal by nature. Shared rooms. Shared meals. Shared grief. Shared everything. Shared souls, it seemed like. Privacy existed only in fragments between missions. Slayers fell asleep sitting upright against each other after patrol because exhaustion outweighed embarrassment eventually.

But your solitude felt different.

Gyomei heard it in the way you lingered after conversations ended. The way your footsteps slowed outside occupied rooms late at night before continuing onward again. The way you sat on the engawa during storms instead of retreating fully indoors, positioned just close enough to hear other people breathing through thin shoji walls.

Isolation makes me hungry.

The thought arrived one evening while rain moved softly across the estate roofs overhead.

Gyomei sat near the outer gardens with prayer beads resting heavy between his palms while tears slid quietly down his face as they almost always did these days, warm tracks against weathered skin while the smell of wet earth drifted through the night air. Most slayers had gone to sleep already. The estate breathed quieter after midnight. Fewer footsteps. Softer voices. The occasional cough from recovery rooms near the Butterfly Estate wing.

And then your footsteps approached. Iguro’s followed half a pace behind.

Gyomei recognized both of you immediately.

Your stride always carried motion inside it, restless even while tired. Obanai’s was quieter. Controlled carefully enough that most people probably never noticed how often his pace adjusted unconsciously around others.

Tonight, both of you sounded exhausted. Wood creaked softly nearby as somebody sat down against one of the engawa pillars. You, judging by the uneven exhale afterward. A second later another shift of weight settled beside you. Closer than politeness required.

Neither of you spoke for a while. Rain tapped steadily against the roof. Kaburamaru moved somewhere overhead with the soft dry sound of scales against wood.

Then you sighed.

“Don’t fall asleep out here,” Obanai said quietly.

“You’re also out here.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I.”

A pause.

Then softer:

“You haven’t slept properly in three days.”

Gyomei’s fingers stilled briefly against his prayer beads.

You laughed softly through your nose.

“That obvious?”

“To me.”

“That’s unfortunate.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“There he is.”

Another silence settled afterward. Gyomei found himself smiling faintly through the tears that had suddenly welled up and overflowed.

Most people feared silence because they treated it like emptiness. Something to fill before it became awkward. But there were other kinds too. Silences built carefully between people who no longer needed constant reassurance of each other’s presence.

This one felt warm.

Will you stay here till I sleep?

The thought surfaced gently.

Not because either of you said it aloud, but rather because the shape of the conversation carried it anyway.

Gyomei had lived long enough to recognize care disguised as irritation. To recognize the subtle sound of people positioning themselves around each other instinctively. Obanai sat angled slightly toward you even now. Gyomei could hear it in the direction of his breathing.

Protective, though he would likely rather die than admit to the word.

Rain continued falling softly around the estate. At some point your breathing slowed. Then slowed again.

Eventually Obanai spoke into the quiet.

“He’s asleep,” he murmured.

Gyomei realized belatedly the words were directed toward him.

“I gathered as much,” Gyomei replied gently.

For a moment, neither of you moved.

Then Obanai exhaled very quietly through his nose.

“He’ll wake up sore if he stays there.”

“And yet,” Gyomei said softly, “you have not moved him.”

Another pause.

The rain softened further outside. Somewhere distant, wind chimes knocked lightly together near the gardens.

Finally Obanai answered, voice low enough it nearly disappeared beneath the weather.

“He sleeps better around people.”

Something inside Gyomei’s chest ached softly at that.

Because yes, he had noticed, and not just with you, with many slayers. People who survived long enough inside the Corps often forgot how to rest alone. Too many nights sleeping beside dying friends. Too many missions where isolation meant vulnerability. Human beings were not built to carry fear in solitude forever.

You’ll return home in the morning.

Gyomei listened to your breathing even gradually against the pillar beside Obanai while tears continued slipping quietly down his face, steady and unhidden as rainfall.

But you never really leave.

That was the strange thing about love, he thought quietly.

People left traces of themselves behind in the bodies of those who cared for them. In routines. In instincts. In the unconscious way somebody reached automatically for a second tea cup before remembering they were alone.

Obanai would carry the shape of your existence with him now whether he wanted to or not.

And judging by the softness hidden carefully beneath his stillness tonight, perhaps he no longer minded that very much at all.

. . .

Shinobu learned very early that grief changed the way people moved.

Not immediately.

Immediately after loss, most people became louder. They cried openly or screamed or broke things with shaking hands because the human body rejected absence on instinct. There was something almost comforting about those first reactions because they were honest in a way nothing else could be. Raw enough that nobody could disguise them properly.

The dangerous grief came later. The Corps was full of that sort of grief.

It lived in the estate halls like another resident. Sat beside slayers during meals. Slept curled quietly at their backs. Shinobu saw it everywhere if she looked long enough. In the way older slayers memorized new recruits’ names too quickly because some part of them was already preparing for memorial tablets. In the way people lingered outside occupied recovery rooms after everyone else had gone to sleep. In the way everybody at the Butterfly Estate unconsciously learned to recognize footsteps because someday one set would stop returning.

You carried grief strangely.

That was the first thing Shinobu noticed about you.

The first time she stitched you back together properly, you spent most of it talking to Kanao about a slayer who had died nearly eight months earlier.

Not in a mournful way either.

Like the dead man had simply stepped outside for a moment and might return if the conversation lasted long enough.

“He hated natto,” you said while Shinobu threaded a needle through torn skin near your ribs. “Said it felt like he was eating spider eggs.”

Kanao giggled lightly.

Shinobu glanced up briefly.

Your expression had softened in that strange absent way people got sometimes when memory temporarily replaced reality for a few seconds. Kanao’s coin flipped and she spoke in her usual shy way. 

“You remembered that?”

“He complained about it every breakfast for three straight weeks,” you replied. “Hard thing to forget.”

Neither of you noticed Shinobu watching.

That happened often around you.

People relaxed without realizing it.

Not because you were particularly comforting. You weren’t soft in the traditional sense. Half the time you looked vaguely feral, sleeves rolled carelessly while blood dried beneath your fingernails and your hair sat in whatever direction it pleased after patrol. But there was something deeply human about the way you paid attention to people. You remembered tiny things most others discarded without thinking. Favorite foods. Habits. Stories told half asleep during recovery periods.

And more than once, Shinobu caught you repeating jokes made by dead slayers like you refused to let their voices disappear completely. The thought settled quietly into place one evening while Shinobu watched you sitting alone on the engawa outside the recovery rooms, as if on watch, rain tapping softly against the estate roofs overhead while your swords rested beside you within easy reach.

Most people avoided the Butterfly Estate unless they needed treatment.

You lingered there, made it a point to show up at least once a week. The younger slayers liked you. That helped. You brought strange little things back from patrol sometimes. Candy from market stalls. Interesting stones. Feathers. Once an absolutely hideous ceramic frog that somehow became permanent decoration near the daidokoro, but Shinobu noticed the deeper pattern eventually.

You stayed because people died there.

And some part of you seemed determined to ensure they remained witnessed afterward.

.

.

.

The thing about the Demon Slayer Corps was that eventually everybody started romanticizing suffering a little.

Shinobu hated that.

Hated the way exhaustion became proof of devotion. Hated the way people treated self-destruction like holiness if it happened in service of protecting others. Young slayers arrived frightened and human and slowly learned to wear pain like ceremonial armor.

Sometimes she caught herself doing it too.

That was the worst part.

Kanae still lived in every room of the Butterfly Estate. In every flower arrangement. Every medicine shelf. Every gentle correction Shinobu gave younger girls recovering from missions. Her sister’s memory sat on Shinobu’s shoulders so constantly that some days she forgot where her own body ended beneath it.

And underneath all of that grief sat something colder.

Purpose.

Sharp enough to cut her open from the inside if she thought about it too long.

Every bottle of poison she crafted, every experiment, every dose she fed herself slowly over years while nobody watched carefully enough to notice.

She had built her own body into a weapon one mouthful at a time. Saturated herself with wisteria poison so thoroughly that someday, when Douma finally consumed her, he would choke to death on the thing he thought he had won.

Martyrdom disguised as medicine.

And the truly horrifying thing was that sometimes the plan comforted her.

“The weight upon my shoulders felt so divine.”

Shinobu understood that feeling more than she wanted to.

The unbearable seduction of purpose, the relief of deciding your death would mean something before the world could make it meaningless instead.

That was why she recognized the shape of it in you too.

Not the martyrdom itself. You weren’t suicidal in the same cold deliberate way she was.

But she saw the same dangerous relationship with suffering buried beneath your smile. The same willingness to carve pieces off yourself for other people until eventually there might not be enough left to return intact.

She noticed the way your body reacted whenever casualty crows arrived at the estate. The way your attention sharpened instantly whenever injured slayers returned from patrol. The way you unconsciously took inventory of who sat where during dinner and noticed absences before anybody else spoke them aloud.

You carried people with you.

Everywhere.

And sometimes Shinobu wondered if you even realized how much space the dead occupied inside you anymore, if you ever did in the first place.

.

.

.

The first time Shinobu understood the situation with Obanai fully, she almost laughed out loud.

Not because it was funny, but because it was absurdly obvious in hindsight.

The Butterfly Estate was quiet that night. Late enough most patients had finally fallen asleep, but early enough that the cicadas still screamed, and for a little while, they were the only things screaming since it was too early for the nightmares. Shinobu had stepped outside carrying fresh bandages when she spotted the two of you sitting near the far end of the hallway beneath dim lanternlight.

You were half asleep already.

That much was immediately obvious.

One shoulder rested against the wooden support pillar while your head tilted slightly backward, eyes barely open beneath exhaustion. Your swords sat discarded beside you within easy reach. Obanai occupied the space beside you with Kaburamaru coiled loosely around his shoulders while he changed the bandages wrapped around your forearm with slow precise movements.

“You’re hovering,” you mumbled.

“You’re bleeding through the bandages again.”

Shinobu paused silently near the corner of the engawa without announcing herself.

Obanai finished tying the fresh bandage, and you didn’t pull away once. That alone felt strange enough to witness.

Most people tolerated treatment from Shinobu because they had to. Injuries made touch unavoidable in the Corps, but outside of necessity, slayers tended to maintain distance instinctively. Trauma made people strange about closeness.

Yet here you sat half asleep against a pillar while Obanai’s hands moved carefully over your arm without either of you seeming aware of how intimate the scene looked from the outside.

Then you blinked slowly at him through obvious exhaustion and said quietly:

“You should sleep.”

Obanai’s hands paused briefly.

“You first.”

“With a goddess in my right eye.”

The saying surfaced suddenly in Shinobu’s mind before she could stop it, not because either of you resembled gods, but because of the watching. The endless watching.

You tracked Obanai constantly without seeming conscious of it. The sound of his footsteps. His breathing during sparring. Whether he’d eaten after missions. And Obanai–

Obanai watched you like somebody trying desperately to memorize something before it vanished. Shinobu knew that look. People in the Corps learned it quickly.

The realization landed cold beneath her ribs, because that was what all of this really was underneath the rooftop antics and the sharp-tongued flirting disguised as arguments.

Two people trying very hard not to lose another thing they loved, even if neither of you would ever say it aloud, and suddenly, horribly, selfishly, Shinobu wondered what it would feel like to have somebody look at her that way before she died.

Not as a Hashira or a weapon or Kanae’s surviving sister carrying revenge around inside her like a second skeleton.

Just… 

Her.

The thought vanished almost immediately afterward.

Still, the feeling it left behind lingered unpleasantly beneath her skin long after she returned inside.

. . .

Tanjiro always knew when you and Iguro-san were nearby.

Usually before anybody else did.

He never really saw you guys. Most of the time he didn’t. That was sort of the point, actually. Kagaya-sama had started shifting mission structures slowly after too many lower-ranked slayers died before support could arrive. Now, when possible, stronger slayers shadowed dangerous routes from a distance, as a type of hidden insurance. Enough space not to reveal themselves too early, but close enough to intervene if something went catastrophically wrong.

Most recruits never noticed.

Tanjiro always did.

Iguro-san’s scent carried coldness even when he stayed hidden. Not unpleasant. Just sharp in a way that reminded Tanjiro of rainwater over smooth stone. Controlled. Careful. Tension wrapped tightly enough around him that sometimes Tanjiro wondered if his muscles ever truly relaxed even while sleeping.

Your scent was harder to describe.

Warm cedar. Metal. Wind. Blood sometimes, old enough not to alarm him anymore. And underneath it all something restless that shifted constantly depending on your mood, like your emotions moved too quickly to settle properly into one thing before becoming another. Tanjiro noticed that part most during quiet moments. Around crowds you smelled brighter somehow. More awake. But when everyone else finally drifted asleep at night, there were moments where loneliness slipped through your scent so suddenly and sharply that Tanjiro’s chest hurt afterward without fully understanding why.

The road cut narrow through dense forest for most of the journey, damp earth soft beneath sandals while cicadas screamed overhead loud enough to blur together into one endless living sound. Zenitsu complained almost continuously for the first day. Inosuke vanished into the trees every twenty minutes like an aggressive woodland cryptid before reappearing covered in leaves and deeply convinced he had won fights nobody else witnessed. Nezuko slept quietly inside her box against Tanjiro’s back while the younger slayers assigned to the mission tried very hard not to look frightened whenever conversation lulled for too long.

Tanjiro understood why Kagaya-sama had sent backup.

There had been too many recent disappearances. Far, far too many casualty crows returning alone. Too many missions where entire groups simply vanished before help arrived.

The tension sat underneath the trip no matter how much people joked during meals, but every time Tanjiro caught the faint shifting scent of cedar and serpent scales somewhere deeper in the trees, something inside him loosened a little.

You and Iguro-san never stayed close for long. That was part of the strategy. Far enough away not to reveal yourselves. Close enough to intervene if necessary. Still, Tanjiro noticed things. The occasional glimpse of movement high in the branches overhead. Fresh footprints near streams where nobody from their own group had stopped. The way birds startled suddenly from certain trees while passing.

And at night, after campfires burned low and everybody else drifted asleep, Tanjiro sometimes caught the soft murmur of voices somewhere deeper in the woods while he sat awake beside Nezuko’s box.

Not full conversations, just the shape of one.

The mission itself stretched longer than expected.

That happened sometimes. Information traveled slowly between villages, especially smaller ones buried deep in mountain regions where demons could hunt for months before rumors reached the Corps properly. Every town along the route carried the same uneasy smell once Tanjiro noticed it. Fear settling permanently into buildings. Sleeplessness. Doors locked earlier than usual. Mothers pulling children closer whenever sunset approached.

The younger slayers traveling with them tried hard to act calm about it, although most failed. Tanjiro remembered when he had been like that too. He almost missed it sometimes, though it was inconvenient and scary and hard, he also hadn’t been exposed to as many horrendous things yet.

Tanjiro noticed the way they checked the treeline too often while walking. The way conversation died completely once dusk started bleeding through the forest. One boy barely older than him polished his sword every single night before bed with shaking hands he thought nobody else noticed.

Tanjiro pretended not to notice either, sometimes embarrassment made fear worse, a fact he’d learned while travelling with Zenitsu and Inosuke.

Still, every time anxiety thickened too heavily through the group, something would happen.

A branch overhead would rustle, or a pebble would bounce lightly off Inosuke’s head from somewhere unseen in the trees, or suddenly, without explanation, a wrapped rice cake or skewer of grilled fish would appear beside one of the younger slayers too nervous to eat properly.

Nobody ever saw who placed them there.

Tanjiro always knew.

The first time it happened, Zenitsu stared at the food like it might explode.

“…did the forest just feed me?”

From somewhere high overhead, hidden completely by leaves, Tanjiro smelled amusement immediately followed by Iguro-san’s irritation.

“You’re terrifying him,” Iguro-san hissed quietly enough that only Tanjiro caught it, although had Zenitsu been listening, he probably would have caught it too, but he was too busy marvelling over the free food.

“He looked sad.”

“He looked cautious. There’s a difference.”

“He accepted the fish.”

“Because he thought rejecting mystery meat from the trees would offend a spirit.”

“That’s fair honestly.”

Zenitsu nearly screamed when another pebble bounced off his shoulder moments later.

Tanjiro had to hide his face behind his tea cup so nobody saw him laughing.

.

.

.

The first time Tanjiro properly saw you during the mission happened entirely by accident.

Rain started suddenly sometime near midday, hard enough that the roads became muddy almost immediately. The younger slayers rushed to cover supplies while Inosuke started yelling excitedly about “battle weather.” Zenitsu threatened death. Nezuko’s box had to be wrapped quickly beneath spare cloth to keep water from soaking through the wood.

The nearest shelter ended up being an abandoned shrine half overtaken by moss and climbing vines near the roadside.

Everyone crowded together dripping wet beneath the old wooden roof while thunder rolled low through distant mountains. One of the younger slayers started trying unsuccessfully to relight a cooking flame with damp hands.

Tanjiro caught your scent before he saw you.

Cedar.

Rainwater.

Then movement shifted near the shrine roof overhead.

You dropped soundlessly from the branches above onto the outer edge of the engawa hard enough to spray water sideways from soaked haori fabric. One of the younger slayers made a noise somewhere between a gasp and a prayer.

You blinked at all of them.

Then at Tanjiro.

Then slowly looked upward toward the trees.

“…they noticed me.”

“I told you to stay higher,” Iguro-san’s voice came flatly from somewhere unseen.

“It’s raining.”

Another pause.

Then Iguro-san appeared too, descending almost silently from higher branches with Kaburamaru looped around his shoulders while rain slid silver down the bandages across his face.

The younger slayers looked moments away from spontaneous ascension.

Tanjiro understood why.

Hashira always felt slightly unreal in close quarters, like weapons pretending temporarily to be people, but the strange thing was that you immediately disrupted the atmosphere simply by existing beside Iguro-san.

You peeled soaked outer layers off with obvious annoyance while muttering about “mosquito-infested mountain hell” and sat cross-legged near the shrine entrance like you belonged there naturally. Kaburamaru abandoned Iguro-san almost immediately in favor of winding around your wrist.

“You’re encouraging favoritism,” Iguro-san muttered.

“He likes me because I’m beautiful.”

“He likes you because you feed him scraps.”

“Again. Beauty.”

Tanjiro watched one younger slayer stare at the interaction with the exact expression of somebody witnessing divine prophecy. He couldn’t even blame the kid, because Iguro-san changed around you in tiny ways most people would probably miss if they weren’t paying attention closely.

Annoyance surfaced immediately instead of being sharpened into cruelty first. Concern slipped visibly into his posture whenever you moved too suddenly after missions. Even the cadence of his voice shifted slightly around you, lower and less guarded somehow.

You stopped looking over your shoulder every five seconds when Iguro-san sat nearby.

Tanjiro noticed that too.

.

.

.

That night the rain continued long after camp had been set up beneath thick trees near the road.

Everything smelled damp. Wet earth. Smoke struggling against soaked firewood. Mud clinging stubbornly to sandals left beside sleeping rolls. Zenitsu spent nearly twenty minutes complaining that the steady drip of the rainwater was obnoxious before finally exhausting himself into unconsciousness.

Tanjiro stayed awake longer than usual.

Partially because Nezuko shifted restlessly inside the box whenever storms grew loud.

Partially because he could smell you nearby.

Closer than usual tonight.

The younger slayers slept packed tightly together beneath shared blankets while rain hammered steadily overhead. Tanjiro sat near the dying fire slowly drying Nezuko’s box with spare cloth when your scent drifted suddenly closer through the dark.

Not stealthy enough to hide from him.

You emerged from the trees carrying two rabbits loosely by the back legs while rainwater dripped steadily from your hair onto your shoulders.

Several younger slayers startled awake instantly.

“Oh good,” you said flatly. “The haunted ones are conscious.”

One boy blinked at you sleepily. “Where did you come from?”

“The horrors.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re getting.”

Then you crouched beside the fire and started skinning one rabbit with alarming efficiency while Iguro-san appeared moments later from deeper in the trees carrying dry branches balanced over one shoulder.

Tanjiro blinked.

Because the image felt strangely domestic despite everything.

You arguing quietly over how close the meat should sit to the fire while Iguro-san fixed the cooking setup with visible irritation.

Like this had happened dozens of times before, and who knows, maybe it had. Tanjiro realized suddenly that he knew almost nothing about either of your lives outside combat.

That felt strange.

The Corps existed in fragments most of the time. Missions. Recovery periods. Meetings. People disappeared for weeks between assignments and returned bloodied and exhausted with entirely new scars nobody asked about.

Yet watching you and Iguro-sani move around each other now made Tanjiro feel like he was accidentally glimpsing something deeply personal.

You handed Iguro-sani your sword absentmindedly while wrapping one palm where the skin had split open sometime during travel. He cleaned rainwater from the blade automatically without being asked.

Tanjiro looked away afterward because suddenly the intimacy of it embarrassed him for reasons he couldn’t explain properly.

Somewhere beside him, Zenitsu–who had apparently woken up silently for once in his entire life–leaned close enough to stage-whisper:

“…they’re SO weird.”

.

.

.

“They’re weird,” Tanjiro whispered to Nezuko one evening.

The box shifted faintly against the log beside him.

“I don’t mean bad weird,” he clarified quickly. “Just… strange.”

Rain tapped softly against the leaves overhead while the rest of camp slept nearby. Zenitsu snored loud enough to qualify as a weather event. Inosuke had somehow rotated completely sideways during sleep and currently occupied enough space for three people. One younger slayer twitched visibly every few seconds from silent nightmares, hands tightening unconsciously around his blanket whenever thunder rolled low yet again in the distance.

Tanjiro smiled faintly before glancing toward the forest.

He couldn’t see either of you tonight.

Iguro-san’s scent lingered sharper whenever Tanjiro focused carefully enough on the surrounding air. Yours drifted closer than usual tonight. Probably perched somewhere in the trees overhead watching camp while everybody slept. 

“You know how some people act different depending on who they’re around?” Tanjiro whispered softly while adjusting Nezuko’s box a little closer to the fire. “Iguro-san acts different around him.”

The box nudged lightly against his shoulder.

“I think other people notice too. But nobody says anything.”

Tanjiro hesitated briefly, trying to figure out how to explain the feeling properly.

“He makes Iguro-san seem…” He frowned. “More real.”

The words sat strangely inside him afterward because they felt true immediately. Around most people, Iguro-san smelled tense constantly. Like somebody bracing for impact even during quiet moments. His voice stayed measured too, every word chosen carefully before speaking. Even kindness from him felt restrained sometimes, like it had to force its way through layers of instinct before reaching the surface.

Around you, things slipped through. Immediate emotions instead of restrained ones. You stopped moving so restlessly whenever Iguro-san was nearby.

Tanjiro noticed that too.

Not fully still. He didn’t think you were physically capable of ever being fully still. Even sitting down, some part of you stayed in motion. Fingers tapping against sword hilts. Attention drifting toward nearby sounds. Eyes tracking movement automatically, but around Obanai, the restlessness softened.

The thought made Tanjiro’s chest ache strangely because he understood that feeling too. The relief of finding somebody whose presence allowed your body to unclench without permission.

He’d seen it before.

On the mountain with Sabito’s memory.

With Nezuko asleep beside him after nightmares.

Even with Zenitsu and Inosuke now sometimes, during those rare quiet mornings where everybody woke slowly and nobody had died the night before. People carried loneliness in their bodies after enough grief. Tanjiro thought maybe most demon slayers forgot how to put it down again.

You smelled like someone trying very hard to outrun it.

Iguro-san smelled like someone who had simply accepted it as permanent.

But around each other, something changed. Not enough to erase the loneliness entirely, but enough to soften the sharpest edges.

Tanjiro sat quietly for a while after that, listening to rainwater hiss softly through leaves overhead while the fire cracked low beside him. Somewhere deeper in the forest, he caught the faint sound of movement across bark. Not stealthy enough to hide from him. Probably you changing positions in the trees again.

“You know what’s weird though?” Tanjiro whispered eventually.

The box shifted again.

“I don’t think they know they’re obvious.”

That part genuinely fascinated him.

Not because the two of you acted openly affectionate. You didn’t. Most of the time your interactions just looked argumentative to anyone not paying close attention. Earlier that afternoon he’d watched the two of you quietly bicker for nearly five minutes because you wanted to walk along the edge of a steep ravine instead of the actual road.

“It’s faster.”

“It’s unstable.”

“You’re dramatic.”

“You nearly fell.”

“I recovered beautifully.”

“You recovered because I caught you by the back of your haori like an animal.”

“That sounds like teamwork to me.”

The younger slayers nearby had looked vaguely terrified the entire exchange.

Meanwhile Tanjiro stood there holding supplies thinking:

oh.
this is just how they talk to each other.

Because beneath the irritation, neither of you ever smelled angry.

Exasperated sometimes, embarrassed occasionally.

Especially Iguro-san, heavy on the embarrassment. Tanjiro thought faintly that it may be because Iguro-san had never experienced anything like this.

Tanjiro noticed things like that constantly now. The way Iguro-san unconsciously walked on the outer edge of roads whenever you traveled together. The way your scent sharpened immediately whenever Iguro-san got injured during training demonstrations, even tiny cuts. The way both of you tracked each other’s positions during combat without ever visibly checking first.

Earlier that morning while crossing a river, one of the younger slayers slipped on wet stones and nearly fell hard enough to crack his head open. Everybody reacted at once, but Tanjiro noticed something else instead. You had turned so quickly toward the sound that your hand caught briefly against the back of Iguro-san’s wrist while moving past him.

Iguro-san immediately shifted sideways afterward to give you room to move.

No hesitation, or even surprise. Neither of you even acknowledged it afterward.

Tanjiro didn’t think you even realized you’d done it. The realization warmed something soft inside his chest. For all the violence inside the Corps, moments like that still existed somehow. Tiny unconscious kindnesses surviving between people who spent most of their lives surrounded by death.

The rain softened eventually into a faint mist drifting through the trees.

Nearby, Zenitsu rolled over in his sleep and muttered something incoherent about dying unmarried.

Tanjiro laughed quietly through his nose.

Then his expression softened again as he glanced toward the dark woods beyond camp.

“I think they make each other less lonely,” he whispered finally.

The words felt important once spoken aloud. Tanjiro didn’t think loneliness disappeared that easily, especially not for people carrying as much grief as both of you clearly did, but there was a difference between carrying loneliness alone and carrying it beside somebody willing to recognize the weight.

Tanjiro thought maybe that was what he kept noticing every time you and Iguro-san stood near each other.

The box nudged lightly against his shoulder again.

Tanjiro smiled.

“I know,” he whispered softly. “I think it’s nice too.”

High above the camp, hidden completely somewhere in the trees, Tanjiro caught the faint scent of embarrassment blooming suddenly sharp through your usually controlled scent profile.

Which meant one horrifying thing.

He had heard all of that.

Tanjiro went completely rigid.

Then, very slowly, lowered his face into his hands while Nezuko’s box shook faintly beside him with what he was almost certain counted as silent laughter.

.

.

.

The first time Tanjiro fought beside you during the mission, he finally understood why other slayers found you unsettling.

You moved strangely.

Not wrong, and not reckless in the way Inosuke was reckless, just difficult to predict.

Most swordsmen carried rhythm inside their movements. Even the Hashira did. Patterns existed beneath breathing styles if somebody watched closely enough. Tanjiro noticed things like that instinctively. Water Breathing had rhythm. Rengoku-san’s movements had rhythm. Even Zenitsu’s terrifying lightning-fast strikes followed a specific pulse once Tanjiro learned to watch for it.

Your dual swords disrupted rhythm instead of following it.

One blade moved fast enough already, but the second made people hesitate.

Demons too.

The attack itself happened just before dawn.

One of the younger slayers had gone missing during the night. Not entirely. There was no blood near camp, no signs of struggle, but his scent trail cut sharply away from the road toward dense forest without warning. Fear lingered faintly along the path beneath damp earth and crushed leaves.

Everybody woke instantly after that.

No complaints from Zenitsu. No jokes from Inosuke. Even the forest itself felt wrong somehow, air thick and watchful while mist dragged low between trees thick enough to block out most of the morning light.

Tanjiro stayed near the center of the group while tracking the missing slayer’s scent, hand wrapped tight around his sword hilt as branches scraped softly against his sleeves while they moved deeper into the woods.

Then the smell hit him.

Blood.

Fresh.

Too much.

“WAIT–”

The demon lunged before he finished speaking.

Huge.

Fast.

Its body unfolded wrong from the trees ahead of them, limbs too long and mouth splitting unnaturally wide as it crashed directly into the center of the group. One younger slayer screamed. Another stumbled backward hard enough to fall.

Chaos exploded instantly.

Tanjiro drew his sword on instinct while Inosuke shouted something feral nearby and Zenitsu immediately began panic-sobbing at life-threatening volume.

The demon moved strangely. Not smart exactly, but adaptive in a way weaker demons usually weren’t. It changed targets too quickly. Every time somebody moved to intercept it, the creature twisted direction mid-lunge like it already anticipated where attacks would land.

Tanjiro nearly lost sight of it twice. Then suddenly you appeared. One second the demon had Tanjiro’s attention.

The next your sword punched clean through its shoulder hard enough to pin the thing sideways into a tree. The entire forest seemed to freeze briefly afterward.

You landed lightly in the mud beside it, both swords already drawn while blood sprayed hot across your sleeves from the impact wound.

The demon shrieked.

You looked annoyed more than anything else.

“Ugly one,” you muttered while ripping the blade free.

Then Tanjiro finally understood why people found you unsettling. You fought unlike anyone he’d ever seen before.

Most swordsmen built momentum through patterns. Even unpredictable styles still carried internal logic eventually. Your movements refused to settle long enough to become familiar. One sword struck high while the second interrupted entirely different angles before the first motion even finished. Your footing changed constantly too, body twisting around attacks instead of meeting them directly.

Tanjiro watched the demon miscalculate distance completely because it focused on your right-hand strike while the second blade curved upward from below fast enough to split its jaw before it even realized what had happened.

The sound–

God.

Tanjiro still remembered the sound afterward.

Bone.

Steel.

Wet impact.

Then your grin flashed sharp beneath moon-pale morning light while blood splattered warm across your cheek.

Alive with the same intensity in which the demon was going to die. That was the part that unsettled him so badly. The restless distracted energy usually living inside your body vanished completely the moment fighting started. No wandering attention. No lingering glances toward the horizon. Everything narrowed.

The change happened so suddenly it almost felt like watching another person step briefly into your skin, and somehow Tanjiro understood it too well to judge it properly.

The demon lunged again, claws ripping through tree bark where your throat had been less than a second earlier. You bent backward around the strike almost lazily before driving one blade beneath its ribs.

Then the second sword severed both arms.

Too fast.

Far too fast.

Tanjiro barely had time to react before the demon twisted toward one of the younger slayers again. Your body intercepted the attack without hesitation, blades locking against claws hard enough to throw sparks sideways through the fog.

“Left!” you barked.

Tanjiro reacted instantly.

Water Breathing surged through his body while your swords forced the demon briefly off balance just long enough for him to close distance.

The neck came off cleanly afterward. Silence crashed through the forest all at once. Heavy breathing.

Mud.

Blood smell thick enough to choke on.

One younger slayer vomited quietly behind a tree.

You straightened slowly while flicking blood from one blade, chest rising hard beneath your uniform.

Then you laughed.

Breathless.

Bright.

Tanjiro finally understood why your happiness during combat bothered him so much, because it didn’t feel like enjoyment of violence the way Shinazugawa-san relished in it.

It felt like relief from something worse.

.

.

.

Later, while helping wrap one of the younger slayers’ injured arm beside the fire, Tanjiro kept thinking about the expression on your face during the fight.

The camp smelled heavily of antiseptic herbs and smoke now. Everybody looked exhausted in that hollowed-out way missions sometimes caused after sudden violence. One slayer sat staring silently into the fire with blood still drying beneath his fingernails. Zenitsu refused to stop talking, which usually meant he was more frightened than usual.

You sat farther from camp near the treeline cleaning your swords beneath weak afternoon sunlight.

Alone.

Mostly.

Iguro-san looked calmer watching you afterward. Not relaxed exactly. Iguro-san probably wouldn’t relax if the world literally ended around him. But something inside his posture loosened slightly once he confirmed you were uninjured beyond superficial cuts.

“You’re staring,” Zenitsu whispered suddenly.

Tanjiro blinked.

“Huh?”

“You’ve been looking over there for like ten minutes.”

Tanjiro flushed immediately.

“I’m not staring.”

“You’re absolutely staring.”

“I’m thinking.”

“That’s somehow weirder.”

Tanjiro glanced back toward you anyway.

You had one knee drawn loosely upward while wiping blood carefully from the grooves near one tsuba. Iguro-san stood beside you saying something low enough not to carry across camp. Your reply made him visibly irritated almost instantly.

Then Tanjiro smelled it.

Amusement.

Warm and sudden beneath Iguro-san’s sharper scent.

The realization softened something quietly inside Tanjiro’s chest. Usually your attention drifted constantly. Toward nearby sounds. Toward movement. Toward people speaking close enough to overhear. Like some invisible instinct inside you refused to fully rest no matter how safe the situation seemed.

You smelled like somebody trying very hard to outrun emptiness whenever fighting stopped, but sitting beside Iguro-san now, some of that restlessness softened around the edges again.

And maybe that was why Iguro-san stayed so close to you all the time, not because he feared what you might become, but rather because he understood exactly what it felt like when the fighting ended and all the loneliness came rushing back.

.

.

.

Tanjiro discovered the kissing completely by accident.

Which somehow made it worse.

Or maybe better.

He still wasn’t entirely sure.

The camp had settled quiet hours ago beneath the sound of insects and distant river water. The fire burned low enough now that most of the clearing sat wrapped in dim amber shadow while rainwater still dripped occasionally from leaves overhead after the earlier storm. Zenitsu had rolled over in his sleep sometime within the last ten minutes and somehow managed to kick dirt directly onto Nezuko’s box while muttering about “romantic suffering” unconscious enough not to notice.

Tanjiro decided to clean it off before morning.

That was all.

He genuinely had no other intentions.

The stream sat a short distance from camp, moonlight silver against moving water while damp grass soaked through the hems of his uniform pants almost immediately. The forest smelled rich after rain. Wet bark. Moss. Mud disturbed by passing sandals earlier that evening.

And you.

Closer than usual.

Tanjiro noticed that first. Probably watching camp from somewhere close while Iguro-san patrolled farther out.

Tanjiro stepped around a cluster of slick stones near the bend in the stream and immediately froze so hard his entire nervous system seemed to leave his body at once.

Oh.

Oh no.

No no no.

This was so much worse than he thought.

Because you and Iguro-san weren’t just kissing.

You were kissing.

Against a tree.

Like the two of you had entirely forgotten the existence of human civilization.

Moonlight caught silver against Iguro-san’s bandages that were pulled down to his neck while your hands gripped tight at the front of his uniform hard enough to wrinkle the fabric beneath your fingers. Iguro-san had you halfway pinned between himself and the tree trunk, one hand twisted into the back of your haori while the other rested against your jaw like he physically could not decide whether to pull you closer or hold you still.

Neither of you noticed Tanjiro immediately.

Tanjiro saw enough in those first few seconds to realize with immediate horrifying clarity that this had absolutely been happening for a while.

The familiarity alone gave it away.

The ease of it.

The way your bodies fit together without hesitation.

One of your swords leaned forgotten against the tree nearby while Kaburamaru hung lazily from a higher branch overhead like even the snake had decided this was a normal Tuesday evening occurrence.

Obanai kissed like somebody starving.

That was the worst thing Tanjiro’s brain unfortunately processed before he could stop it, and to make it worse he accidentally disrespected ranks and called his superior by his first name.

Desperate in this quiet restrained way that somehow felt infinitely more intimate than if either of you had been dramatic about it. Every time he pulled back barely far enough to breathe, you immediately followed after him like instinct. Your forehead knocked briefly against his between kisses while Iguro-san muttered something low against your mouth that made you laugh softly through your nose before dragging him right back down again.

Tanjiro’s soul exited his body instantly, not because kissing itself shocked him.

Because the moment felt so private and human and intense that he suddenly wanted to apologize to both of you and possibly the entire forest for existing nearby.

Then Iguro-san made the mistake of pulling your lower lip briefly between his teeth, and you let out the faintest of sounds and Tanjiro spiritually died on the spot.

Absolutely not.

No.

He could not be here for this.

Tanjiro spun around so fast he nearly twisted his ankle on wet stones and immediately marched directly into the stream with all the frantic panic of a man attempting emergency purification.

Cold water splashed violently up his legs while he crouched near the bank aggressively washing his face like physical force alone could remove memories from his brain.

Not because he thought he’d done something wrong.

Just–

Respectfully.

Behind him he heard abrupt movement.

Then your voice.

Horrified.

“Was that Kamado?”

Iguro-san sounded like somebody actively experiencing ego death.

“Yes.”

“Oh my god.”

“He saw us.”

“I gathered that.”

“I think he’s washing his eyes.”

Tanjiro continued violently splashing water onto his face.

Maybe if he drowned himself slightly enough this would stop existing.

Behind him, silence stretched for several unbearable seconds.

Then:

“…how much did he see.”

Tanjiro nearly slipped directly into the stream.

Your answer came immediately.

“All of it probably.”

“Oh my god.”

“I’m pretty sure he saw the tree thing.”

“The what thing?”

“The thing you were doing against the tree.”

“I know what happened against the tree.”

“Apparently Kamado does too.”

Tanjiro made a sound normally associated with dying woodland animals.

Then Iguro-san muttered something so violently embarrassed Tanjiro thankfully couldn’t make out because his brain was already overheating enough.

Water dripped steadily down his face while he contemplated abandoning the Corps permanently and becoming a fisherman somewhere remote. Or, hey, he could go back and become a charcoal seller again!

Behind him he heard fabric rustling.

Then your voice again, quieter this time:

“You think he’s traumatized?”

“Yes.”

“That’s fair honestly.”

“You were the one who started it.”

“You had me against a tree.”

“You were talking.”

“That has literally never stopped you before.”

Tanjiro submerged his entire face in the stream.

.

.

.

Zenitsu found him ten minutes later still sitting beside the water, not upset exactly, just trying to figure out how to unhear and unsee a whole lot.

Moonlight reflected silver across the stream while Tanjiro sat crouched near the bank with soaked sleeves and the expression of a man who had glimpsed something the human brain was never meant to process. Nezuko’s box rested beside him while he stared into the moving water, contemplating how badly it would hurt to drown.

Zenitsu approached cautiously.

“What happened to you,” he whispered immediately. “Why do you look like that.”

Tanjiro looked up slowly.

There was a full three seconds where he seriously considered lying. Then Zenitsu sat down beside him with enough concern in his face that guilt immediately won.

“Okay,” Tanjiro said carefully. “But you absolutely cannot tell anybody.”

Zenitsu leaned forward instantly.

“I SWEAR.”

“No seriously, Zenitsu.”

“I SWEAR ON NEZUKO-CHAN.”

Tanjiro lowered his voice anyway.

“I accidentally saw Iguro-san and him making out...”

Zenitsu inhaled so sharply Tanjiro genuinely thought for one beautiful hopeful second that he might actually stay quiet from shock alone.

Instead:

“WHAT?!?!”

Birds exploded upward from nearby trees.

Tanjiro slapped both hands over Zenitsu’s mouth so fast he nearly tipped both of them sideways into the river.

“SHHHHHHHHH.”

Zenitsu’s eyes looked ready to physically detach from his skull.

“THEY’RE WHAT?!” he whisper-screamed through Tanjiro’s hands.

“QUIET.”

“IGURO-SAN?!” Zenitsu looked seconds from cardiac arrest. “LIKE. ROMANTICALLY?!”

“I THINK SO?!”

“OH MY GOD.”

“ZENITSU.”

“I THOUGHT THEY WERE JUST WEIRD.”

“I THINK THEY’RE WEIRD AND IN LOVE.”

Zenitsu stared at him in complete horror.

Then, much quieter:

“…that actually explains a lot.”

Tanjiro dropped his face into his hands with a groan so exhausted it sounded ancient.

Unfortunately, Zenitsu immediately grabbed his shoulders.

“WAIT WAIT WAIT.”

“Absolutely not.”

“What do you MEAN?!”

“I’m not discussing this with you.”

“You can’t just SAY THAT and then stop talking!”

“I absolutely can.”

“What did you SEE?”

Tanjiro made a noise usually associated with dying prey animals.

“Nothing.”

“That’s a lie.”

“It was respectful.”

“That sentence means NOTHING.”

Tanjiro could physically feel his soul attempting to leave through his ears.

Zenitsu leaned closer.

“How bad was it.”

“Zenitsu.”

“How bad.”

“Please stop talking.”

“WAS THERE TONGUE?”

“ZENITSU.”

“THERE WAS TONGUE?!” Zenitsu clutched his own head in horror. “OH MY GOD.”

“I DIDN’T SAY THAT.”

“YOU DIDN’T DENY IT.”

“I DON’T WANT TO THINK ABOUT IT.”

“But now I’m thinking about it!”

“I’m suffering enough for both of us!”

Zenitsu looked genuinely distraught now, hands gripping fistfuls of his own hair while he stared at Tanjiro like he’d returned from war.

“No because wait,” he whispered frantically. “WAIT. Was this recent? Has this been happening the ENTIRE TIME?”

“I DON’T KNOW.”

“You absolutely know.”

“I DO NOT.”

“You SAW them.”

“AGAINST MY WILL.”

Zenitsu gasped suddenly.

“Oh my god.”

“What.”

“The hand-holding.”

Tanjiro froze.

“The WHAT.”

“The hand-holding!” Zenitsu whisper-hissed. “I thought they were just weirdly clingy but now it all makes sense!”

Tanjiro stared at him.

Then, horrifyingly:

…the hand-holding.

Because there had been hand-holding.

Tiny things.

You grabbing Obanai’s sleeve absentmindedly while talking.

Obanai catching your wrist automatically while crossing steep terrain.

The weird unconscious touching that neither of you seemed aware you were doing half the time.

Tanjiro felt himself deteriorating further.

“No,” he whispered weakly.

“YES.”

“Zenitsu stop.”

“THEY’VE BEEN FLIRTING THIS WHOLE TIME.”

“I DON’T THINK IGURO-SAN KNOWS HOW TO FLIRT.”

“APPARENTLY HE DOES.”

Tanjiro dropped sideways into the grass face-first.

Zenitsu grabbed him by the shoulders again immediately.

“WAIT WAIT WAIT.”

“NO MORE WAIT.”

“What were they doing exactly.”

Tanjiro went completely still.

Then very slowly lifted his head enough to stare at Zenitsu with the hollow eyes of a deeply haunted man.

“…against a tree.”

Zenitsu’s soul visibly exited his body.

The silence afterward lasted almost ten full seconds.

Then:

“WHAT.”

“I KNOW.”

“LIKE. LEANING AGAINST IT?”

Tanjiro buried his face back into the grass.

“I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT.”

“NO YOU CAN’T SAY THAT AND EXPECT ME TO MOVE ON.”

“I’M TRYING TO MOVE ON.”

“WAS IGURO-SAN THE ONE PINNING HIM OR–”

“ZENITSU I AM GOING TO DROWN MYSELF.”

Zenitsu slapped both hands over his own mouth to stop himself from screaming again.

It did not fully work.

A horrible strangled wheezing noise escaped him instead while he rocked back and forth in visible distress.

“Oh my god,” he whispered through his fingers. “Oh my god. The staring makes sense now.”

Tanjiro lifted his head weakly.

“The what.”

“The STARING. Iguro-san watches him constantly.”

Tanjiro blinked.

Then, despite himself:

“…he does kind of.”

“HE DOES IT ALL THE TIME.”

“You’re loud enough that they’re going to kill us both.”

“I can’t help it, this is lowkey horrifying. It’s like knowing your parents are having sex.”

Tanjiro rolled onto his back and stared blankly up at the trees overhead while Zenitsu continued spiraling beside him.

“No because now I’m thinking about all the weird things they’ve said to each other.”

“I’m trying very hard not to.”

“‘You fight like an idiot.’”

“That’s normal for them.”

“‘You’d miss me if I died.’”

“…oh.”

“‘Don’t fall asleep out here.’”

“…oh no.”

“THEY WERE BASICALLY COURTING IN FRONT OF US.”

Tanjiro covered his face completely.

“I should’ve stayed asleep.”

“And the food stealing!”

“Zenitsu please.”

“THEY WERE DOING ROMANTIC FOOD STEALING.”

“THAT IS NOT A TERM.”

“IT IS NOW.”

Tanjiro laughed despite himself then immediately regretted it because Zenitsu looked encouraged.

“Oh my god wait.”

“What now.”

Zenitsu leaned closer with the intensity of a conspiracy theorist uncovering government secrets.

“Do you think the Hashira know.”

Tanjiro sat bolt upright instantly.

“…oh my god.”

Because Mitsuri absolutely knew, hell she was the Love Hashira, she DEFINITELY knew.

Shinobu probably knew.

Gyomei almost definitely knew somehow in the terrifying all-seeing way Gyomei seemed to know everything.

Tanjiro stared into the middle distance while the full scope of the situation unfolded horrifyingly inside his head.

Zenitsu looked equally devastated beside him.

“We’re the last ones to figure it out,” he whispered.

“I think we might have been the only ones who didn’t.”

The silence afterward felt spiritual.

Then Zenitsu whispered, barely audible:

“…do you think they kiss a lot.”

Tanjiro immediately shoved his face back into the grass with a noise of pure suffering.

. . .

Tengen noticed you because you were entertaining.

That sounded shallow, but he swears that if anyone asks, it wasn’t. He can explain himself, of course.

Most demon slayers became predictable after enough time around them. Trauma narrowed people eventually, which made them repetitive because they learn that deviance from a routine could cause death. Some grew quieter, some crueler, and some wrapped themselves so tightly in duty that eventually there was barely a person left underneath the uniform anymore. Tengen had spent years watching it happen. Slayers entered the Corps loud and terrified and human, then slowly wore themselves down into weapons sharp enough to survive.

You, unfortunately, remained interesting, which was impressive considering the amount of blood constantly involved in your daily life.

Tengen first realized something was deeply wrong with you during a mission debrief when you interrupted a Kakushi halfway through a casualty report to ask if anybody else could hear a cat screaming outside.

Everybody stopped talking.

The room went silent.

One terrified lower-ranked slayer actually stood up to check.

There was no cat.

You nodded thoughtfully afterward like this confirmed something important about the universe and resumed cleaning blood from one sword while gesturing vaguely for the Kakushi to continue.

Tengen stared at you for a very long time after that.

Not because of the weirdness itself. The Corps was full of deeply strange people. Shinobu smiled like she wanted to poison half the planet. Muichiro occasionally forgot conversations while actively participating in them. Obanai looked at social interaction the way normal people looked at unexploded bombs. Sanemi was the human equivalent of a dog in the corner of the room foaming for no good reason.

No, what interested Tengen was the contrast.

Because beneath the bizarre comments and restless pacing and sideways humor sat somebody genuinely vicious in combat, and not uncontrolled viciousness either.

Precision.

You fought like someone who enjoyed discovering exactly how far a body could move before it stopped functioning properly.

“Hunting for love,” Tengen thought once while watching you from the edge of the training yard beneath late afternoon sunlight.

The realization came suddenly enough that he actually paused mid-conversation.

Because the thing inside you did not resemble ambition. You weren’t chasing rank, hell, you HAD the most respected, coveted rank. Weren’t exactly trying to prove yourself strongest either, that award DEFINITELY went to Gyomei. Didn’t carry that frantic desperate edge younger slayers often developed around Hashira either, you kinda just inserted yourself into spaces and made yourself fit.

You moved through the Corps like somebody starving for connection. Tengen saw it everywhere once he noticed.

The way you drifted naturally toward occupied rooms instead of empty ones. How younger slayers somehow ended up beside you during meals even if there was space elsewhere. The fact you always volunteered for group missions over solo assignments despite clearly being skilled enough to work independently. The way you lingered outside the Butterfly Estate long after treatment finished because somebody inside might still be awake to talk to.

You collected people constantly, like you were terrified that stillness might kill you.

.

.

.

The truly insane part was Obanai.

Tengen noticed that immediately too.

Not because the relationship itself shocked him. Tengen had three wives. He was hardly in a position to judge anybody’s romantic choices. No, what shocked him was the specific chemistry of it.

Because Obanai around you felt like watching a starving wolf discover another animal mean enough to bite back, and apparently both of you found this incredibly attractive.

Tengen realized the situation had escalated far beyond normal friendship during a sparring session that devolved so catastrophically homoerotic he actually had to stop mid-drink and process what he was witnessing.

The communal estate courtyard buzzed loudly beneath afternoon heat while younger slayers crowded shoulder-to-shoulder around the training grounds. Somebody had started taking bets. Shinobu looked seconds from turning around to go back inside. Mitsuri kept making tiny distressed noises into her hands every time one of you got too close to the other.

And in the center of all of it were you and Obanai, circling each other like a public safety hazard.

Neither of you used wooden swords, naturally, because apparently psychological distress for everyone watching was mandatory.

Steel flashed bright beneath sunlight while your dual blades collided against Obanai’s sword hard enough to throw sparks sideways across the dirt. Most sparring matches carried rhythm somewhere beneath the movement. Even aggressive ones eventually settled into predictable exchanges.

This looked personal, but not the way Sanemi made fights personal, whenever he had a problem with someone. No, this didn’t even look angry, this looked like a fight for the hell of it. Weirdly playful, too.

Tengen watched you duck beneath one of Obanai’s strikes only to immediately shoulder-check him hard enough that both of you nearly lost balance. Obanai recovered first and grabbed a fistful of your sleeve before you could step away.

You laughed. Actually laughed.

Right in the middle of a fight.

“You fight dirty,” you said breathlessly.

“You flirt catastrophically.”

“That sounds like a skill issue.”

“That sounds like brain damage.”

Then you kicked his ankle hard enough to nearly send him sideways.

The younger slayers watching gasped in collective horror.

Obanai looked delighted.

Tengen slowly lowered his tea, then elbowed Kyojuro hard enough in the ribs to get his attention.

“Brother,” he muttered. “Are you seeing this shit or am I hallucinating?”

Kyojuro watched the training yard thoughtfully while one of your swords locked against Obanai’s blade close enough that your faces ended up inches apart.

“…they seem very close!” Kyojuro said brightly.

“That is NOT the sentence I would use here.”

Because this was not normal sparring behavior.

At one point Obanai hooked his foot behind your ankle and drove forward hard enough to slam you flat onto your back in the dirt.

Instead of ending the match like a sane person, he stayed there, one hand braced near your shoulder, both of you breathing hard.

Your expression flashed sharp and exhilarated beneath him while your fingers curled loosely around the front of his uniform like instinct.

Nobody moved.

Nobody breathed.

Tengen watched Mitsuri physically cover her face beside Shinobu.

Then you grinned up at Obanai and said:

“You gonna kiss me or kill me, snakeboy?”

Half the training yard stopped functioning.

Obanai immediately jerked backward like you’d set him on fire while younger slayers started choking violently on absolutely nothing because there’s no way the weird one and the scary one could ever be… well..

Tengen nearly blacked out laughing.

“Oh they are SICK,” he wheezed.

Kyojuro looked delighted.

“AH! COURTSHIP!”

“THAT IS NOT WHAT NORMAL COURTSHIP LOOKS LIKE.”

Meanwhile you sat up still grinning while Obanai stood several feet away looking like he wanted both murder and death simultaneously. Kaburamaru, traitorous little bastard that he was, slithered directly into your lap afterward.

The entire thing felt less like watching two people in love and more like witnessing two predators slowly realize they’d accidentally domesticated each other.

.

.

.

“Killing for pleasure.”

The phrase surfaced in Tengen’s mind later during a mission where he watched you carve through three demons back-to-back without losing momentum once.

Moonlight flashed silver against both swords while blood sprayed across ruined walls around you. Your grin looked sharp enough to cut skin, not cruel exactly, rather, exhilarated. Combat turned the volume down on everything else living inside your head.

Tengen understood that feeling uncomfortably well.

Battle simplified things.

No expectations.

No complicated future waiting afterward.

Instinct.

Survival.

The dangerous part came later, once people started craving that simplicity more than ordinary life. Tengen recognized the signs because he’d spent years clawing his own way out of them. You, unfortunately, still lived there.

.

.

.

Lost in a concrete jungle.

The thought hit Tengen one night while he watched you from the roof of the communal estate.

The compound slept quietly beneath summer air thick enough to cling against skin. Lanternlight glowed dim through shoji screens while distant laughter drifted faintly from the daidokoro where a handful of younger slayers still sat awake eating stolen leftovers. 

Below, you wandered barefoot across the courtyard carrying absolutely no apparent destination in mind. Fireflies buzzed around you, giving you an almost otherworldly look. 

Restless again.

Tengen had started noticing that too.

You hated empty spaces, not even just physically. No, this stretched beyond the feeling of having something to say and then walking into an empty room. 

Whenever rooms cleared out, you left shortly afterward too. Whenever conversation ended, your body found reasons to move elsewhere before silence fully settled around you. Sometimes Tengen caught you lingering near occupied rooms late at night listening quietly to people talk inside without entering yourself.

It was like loneliness physically stalked you. A demon without a corporal form. One that you couldn’t kill with a sword, or even two swords.

Then Obanai appeared from the shadows. You stopped immediately, and Tengen saw your entire body loosen by fractions.

Shoulders lowering slightly.

Breathing evening out.

Obanai said something low enough not to carry upward toward the roof.

You laughed quietly, then, without hesitation, reached out and hooked two fingers loosely through the sleeve near his wrist.

Unconscious enough that neither of you seemed aware you’d done it.

Obanai looked down briefly at your hand.

Then allowed it to remain there while both of you continued walking slowly through the courtyard together.

Tengen leaned back against the roof tiles afterward smiling helplessly into the night sky.

Because there it was.

The answer.

“I become an animal.”

Maybe combat wasn’t the only thing capable of quieting whatever lonely starving thing lived inside your chest. Maybe another wounded creature had simply recognized the sound of your heartbeat and answered it instinctively.

Disgustingly romantic.

Tengen was obsessed with it immediately.

. . .

Obanai hated waiting.

Violently, as a matter of fact.

Waiting implied helplessness. It implied sitting still while something important existed somewhere beyond the reach of his hands, and there were very few things in this world Obanai trusted less than distance. You had left sometime before dawn with no note, no warning, nothing except the lingering scent of cedar and rainwater still trapped faintly in the blankets beside him (because that was a new development, you'd stopped sleeping outside and started sleeping next to him) and the soft creak of floorboards cooling after your footsteps disappeared from the estate. Obanai woke reaching instinctively toward empty space. The absence hit immediately. Cold. Wrong.

By the time he learned you’d taken a last-minute escort mission north with several lower-ranked slayers, something ugly had already rooted itself beneath his ribs.

Not fear.

Obanai knew fear intimately. Fear was clean. Understandable. Fear was survival. Fear was childhood. Fear was every moment of his life before he clawed himself out of that cage, and the Corps dragged him bleeding out of that cult. This felt worse. Restlessness crawled beneath his skin hard enough to make him physically incapable of staying still. He tried remaining inside for maybe ten minutes after sunrise before standing so abruptly Kaburamaru lifted his head in visible irritation.

The estate felt too quiet without you in it.

That realization alone nearly ruined his entire day.

Logically, nothing had changed. Slayers still moved through the hallways. The daidokoro still smelled faintly of rice and smoke from the morning fire. Somebody laughed outside near the engawa while training matches started in the courtyard with the dull repetitive crack of wooden swords colliding against each other. Everything was normal. So why the hell did it feel like somebody had removed a floorboard somewhere inside his chest.

Obanai paced.

Hour after hour.

Courtyard stones clicked sharply beneath his sandals while Kaburamaru looped tighter and tighter around his shoulders sensing the agitation radiating off him in waves. Morning sunlight shifted slowly across the estate rooftops. Younger slayers passed nearby and immediately rerouted themselves once they caught sight of his expression. Smart. One Kakushi made the mistake of politely asking whether he wanted tea and Obanai answered sharply enough that the poor woman physically recoiled before he even fully processed what he’d said.

“No.”

“Oh. Alright, I just thought–”

“I know what you thought.”

The silence afterward sat heavy and awkward. Obanai watched guilt flicker across her face despite the fact she had done absolutely nothing wrong, and immediately hated himself for it too.

Didn’t apologize though.

Couldn’t.

The thing underneath his ribs kept getting worse.

By midday the entire estate felt aware something was wrong with him. Mitsuri attempted approaching once carrying food and concern written openly across her face. Obanai lasted maybe thirty seconds into the interaction before snapping, “I’m not dying, Kanroji.”

“You look upset…”

“I’m standing.”

“That does not answer my question.”

“Then ask a better one.”

Mitsuri retreated shortly afterward looking deeply wounded.

Again.

Obanai hated himself for that too.

Everything irritated him today. The weather. The noise. The fact one of the younger slayers laughed too loudly near the gate and for one horrible split second Obanai thought it was you returning. It wasn’t. The disappointment hit hard enough to make his stomach twist unpleasantly.

And underneath all of it, there was something uglier.

Obanai realized it slowly sometime during the afternoon while standing rigid beneath the engawa listening to a pair of lower-ranked slayers discussing your mission nearby.

“He stayed behind to help carry one of the injured villagers apparently.”

“He always does that.”

“I heard he gave his food away too.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. Kamado said he barely ate during the last mission either.”

The conversation blurred after that because suddenly Obanai pictured you somewhere miles away smiling tiredly at strangers. Sitting too close beside injured slayers while they patched wounds. Letting people lean against your shoulder while traveling because you never knew how to stop offering pieces of yourself away. Some wounded idiot laughing at something you said while you looked at them with that exhausted crooked grin that softened your whole face without you realizing it.

Something hot turned vicious beneath his ribs.

Jealousy.

The realization hit him hard enough that he actually stopped pacing.

Because no.

Absolutely not.

That emotion was humiliating. Possessive ugly pathetic thing. But once he recognized it, he couldn’t stop seeing it everywhere. The reason he hated when missions paired you with strangers too long. The reason his mood soured instantly whenever younger slayers monopolized your attention during meals. The reason he always tracked where you stood in crowded rooms without thinking first. The reason something inside him twisted violently every time somebody else made you laugh first.

Obanai leaned one shoulder hard against the wooden engawa pillar and shut his eyes briefly.

This was ridiculous.

You were not property.

You were not his.

And yet the idea of you somewhere else smiling softly at somebody who wasn’t him made something genuinely feral bare its teeth inside his chest.

“Let me become an animal.”

The thought surfaced ugly and immediate because that was what this feeling resembled most. Instinct. Possession. The horrible ancient part of his brain that wanted to track your heartbeat personally just to guarantee it kept happening.

Obanai hated it.

Hated how deeply you had worked yourself into his routines without permission. Hated the way his body noticed your absence immediately now. Hated the restless anger chewing through him simply because he woke up alone.

Mostly–

He hated that you knew him well enough to leave quietly.

You knew he would have followed.

.

.

.

The estate gates opened shortly after dark.

Obanai heard them before he saw you. Then your scent hit him all at once.

Blood. Sweat. Exhaustion. Mud. Rainwater.

Alive.

Relief slammed into him so hard it immediately transformed into fury.

You stepped through the gate mid-conversation with one of the younger slayers from the mission, shoulders loose with obvious exhaustion while dried blood darkened one sleeve of your uniform. The slayer beside you was talking animatedly about something and you were actually listening despite looking half dead on your feet, smiling faintly enough that the sight made that ugly jealous thing inside Obanai immediately sink its teeth deeper.

Because of course.

Of course you came back smiling tiredly at somebody else first.

The second you noticed Obanai standing motionless across the courtyard, your expression shifted instantly.

“Oh no,” you muttered.

The younger slayer beside you looked between both of you once and immediately backed away like a man escaping an active explosion site.

“You left,” Obanai said quietly.

Dangerously.

You exhaled slowly through your nose. “It was a last-minute assignment.”

“You left.”

“Yes, Obanai, I heard you the first time.”

“You did not wake me.”

Several nearby slayers suddenly became deeply fascinated by literally anything else, including a plant somehow growing through the cracks in the cobblestone pathway. 

You rubbed one hand across your face tiredly. “It was four in the morning.”

“And?”

“And I was not waking you up at four in the morning just so you could glare at me and insist on coming along half asleep.”

“I would not have been half asleep.”

“You once walked directly into a shoji screen before breakfast.”

“That happened one time.”

“It happened yesterday.”

Obanai stepped closer. Your posture sharpened immediately.

Bad sign.

“You disappeared for an entire day without warning.”

“I was on a mission.”

“You were bleeding.”

“I am literally always bleeding.”

“That is not the point.”

“Then what IS the point?”

Your voice cracked sharply across the courtyard and heads immediately started appearing from hallways and windows nearby. Everyone froze because this.. this was different. Normally your arguments carried heat underneath them. A dangerous sort of flirtation hidden beneath insults.

Not this time.

“You do not get to vanish whenever you feel like it,” Obanai snapped.

“And you do not get to treat me like a dog on a leash.”

“I was worried.”

The words landed between both of you like shattered glass.

Silence.

Even the cicadas sounded quieter afterward.

Your expression changed instantly. Worse. Because suddenly Obanai could see the exact moment you realized how frightened he had actually been.

And then you looked guilty.

Obanai hated that immediately too.

Something raw twisted violently through his chest. “Don’t,” he hissed.

Your brows pulled together. “Don’t what?”

“Do not look at me like that.”

“Obanai–”

“You left.”

“And I came back.”

“You could have died.”

“So could you, every single day!”

The shout cracked through the courtyard hard enough that somebody nearby physically ducked.

You stepped forward suddenly, exhaustion and anger and something rawer burning visibly beneath your skin now. “You think you’re the only person who gets scared?” you snapped. “You think I LIKE waking up and finding you gone on missions half the time? You think I enjoy hearing casualty crows overhead and wondering if this is finally the day somebody tells me you didn’t make it back?”

Obanai froze.

Your breathing came hard now, shoulders tight with fury. “I left because it was a mission. Not because I was trying to run from you.”

“I know that.”

“Then stop acting like I betrayed you.”

The silence afterward hurt because underneath the anger sat something much more dangerous.

Recognition.

The horrible realization that both of you had become important enough to wound each other now.

Obanai looked at you standing there bloodied and furious beneath lanternlight and felt the last thin thread of restraint finally snap apart inside his chest.

“Fine,” he said sharply.

Then grabbed your haori and hauled you forward hard enough that your next breath vanished directly into his mouth.

Somewhere behind you multiple slayers made immediate noises of distress before disappearing back inside at record speed.

The kiss felt furious. Weeks of tension and fear and loneliness crashing together all at once while your hands grabbed fistfuls of Obanai’s uniform hard enough to wrinkle the fabric beneath your fingers.

“Obanai–”

“Shut up.”

“You are literally impossible.”

“And yet.”

You made a sound halfway between anger and laughter before grabbing him right back and slamming him bodily against the side of the nearby storage shed hard enough to rattle the wood.

That was apparently all the permission Obanai needed.

Kaburamaru fled instantly, slithering off at breakneck speed.

Wise animal. Obanai didn’t even mind that it left his vision blurry and out of focus. Vision wasn’t exactly something he needed right now. 

Obanai kissed like a starving thing. Furious desperate pressure and sharp breaths and teeth catching briefly against your lower lip hard enough to make you curse softly into his mouth while one of your hands tangled violently into the back of his uniform.

“Animal,” the thought flashed hot through his head while your body pressed close enough to feel your heartbeat hammering against his chest.

Because that was exactly what loving you reduced him to eventually.

Possessive.

Jealous.

Something with claws.

“You lose control.”

Somewhere across the estate a door slammed hurriedly shut.

Neither of you noticed.

. . .

Kyojuro did not understand either of you.

This was not an insult.

Kyojuro understood many things. Duty. Grief. Kindness. Loneliness, perhaps more than he liked admitting. He understood the sound of people forcing themselves to smile so nobody else worried. He understood carrying impossible expectations so long they started feeling welded directly into your spine.

He did not understand whatever the hell was happening between you and Iguro.

At all.

Which bothered him more than expected.

Because Kyojuro liked understanding people. Even difficult people usually unfolded eventually if treated with enough patience. Sanemi’s anger made sense once you looked beneath it long enough. Shinobu’s sharpness came from grief polished too thin. Obanai himself, despite the intimidating exterior, followed fairly understandable patterns after enough observation. Wary. Defensive. Loyal to the point of self-destruction.

You, however, complicated everything.

And somehow together the two of you became even stranger.

Kyojuro realized this one evening while pacing slowly through the wisteria groves surrounding his estate after dinner, hands folded neatly behind his back while evening cicadas screamed themselves hoarse in the gardens.

The problem was not the relationship itself.

The Corps practically survived on strange emotional attachments. Shared trauma did odd things to people. Kyojuro had seen slayers become inseparable after surviving one difficult mission together. Had seen friendships form overnight because somebody held another person upright while they vomited blood after battle.

No, what confused him was the specificity of the situation.

Because you and Obanai should not have worked together by any logical standard Kyojuro understood.

You were both deeply bizarre people in entirely incompatible directions.

Obanai moved through life like a cat somebody abandoned in a rainstorm too young. Mean because gentleness embarrassed him. Constantly braced for disappointment before it arrived. 

You, meanwhile, drifted through the Corps collecting people like shiny rocks despite behaving with the survival instincts of a man trying to fistfight death because why not.

Somehow Obanai softened around you in tiny horrifyingly visible ways. Kyojuro noticed them constantly now.

The way Obanai unconsciously turned toward your voice before anyone else’s in crowded rooms. The fact Kaburamaru preferred draping around your shoulders half the time now. The way both of you occupied each other’s personal space without thinking first.

Yesterday Kyojuro watched you steal food directly from Obanai’s plate during lunch.

Not ask.

Steal.

Obanai looked offended for maybe three seconds before immediately handing you the rest of it because apparently the laws of nature no longer applied.

Kyojuro had nearly dropped his tea.

“You’re hunting for love.”

The saying surfaced unexpectedly while he paced the outer hallway of the estate listening to wind move softly through the trees.

Because yes.

That was exactly what both of you looked like.

You looked like two lonely creatures who accidentally recognized each other from across a battlefield and decided to start orbiting together before either of you fully understood why.

Somehow that realization made the entire thing feel even stranger.

Kyojuro stopped briefly beside one of the wooden pillars overlooking the garden.

Moonlight silvered the koi pond below while distant laughter drifted faintly from nearby estates. Somewhere farther down the compound, younger slayers still trained despite the late hour. The repetitive sound of wooden practice swords striking each other echoed softly through the night.

Kyojuro sighed.

Because the more he thought about it, the less he understood how the relationship even started.

Who confessed first?

Did either of you confess at all?

Did the two of you simply wake up one morning emotionally entangled like vines after enough missions together?

The possibilities genuinely troubled him.

Especially because every interaction he witnessed somehow raised further questions instead of answering existing ones.

One particularly catastrophic example still haunted him from several weeks earlier.

Kyojuro had been walking through the communal estate toward the courtyard when he found both of you sitting on the engawa together sharing tea in complete silence.

Normal enough.

Then he noticed the position.

You sat one step lower than Obanai with your shoulder resting absentmindedly against his knee while Obanai slowly wrapped a torn strip of bandage around your wrist because apparently you had injured yourself again.

Neither of you acknowledged Kyojuro approaching.

Neither of you looked embarrassed.

The intimacy existed so naturally between you that it genuinely stunned him speechless for several seconds.

Then you looked up and said:

“Rengoku-san, do you think ghosts can drown.”

And Obanai, without even glancing up from your wrist, answered:
“No.”

Like this was a perfectly normal conversation.

Kyojuro had left immediately afterward to preserve his own sanity.

.

.

.

The realization that he needed outside assistance arrived several days later after witnessing the two of you spar in the communal courtyard.

Or rather, whatever deeply concerning thing the two of you considered sparring.

Kyojuro had seen combat between Hashira before. He understood intensity. Competition. 

This looked emotionally charged in ways he found alarming.

Steel rang violently through the courtyard while younger slayers gathered around the edges pretending not to stare openly. Obanai moved sharp and fast, every strike angled with terrifying precision, while you flowed around him instead of directly against him. Two swords flashed silver in your hands quick enough to blur.

Then Obanai swept one strike low.

You dodged backward laughing.

Actually laughing.

“You fight dirty.”

“You flirt catastrophically.”

“That sounds like a skill issue.”

“That sounds like brain damage.”

And then you kicked his ankle hard enough to nearly send him sideways.

The younger slayers watching collectively recoiled.

Obanai looked delighted.

Kyojuro stood there for several seconds trying to understand what exactly he was witnessing before finally deciding this had surpassed his emotional qualifications entirely.

AND THEN THERE WAS THE ONE TIME.

In fairness to Kyojuro, he had not been looking for anything suspicious.

He had been looking for you specifically, yes, but only because Kagaya-sama wanted several mission reports collected before evening and apparently nobody had seen either of you for the better part of an hour, which already should have concerned him in retrospect because when both of you disappeared simultaneously, the outcome statistically tended toward either violence or emotional distress.

Sometimes both.

The late afternoon air hung thick and gold across the estate while cicadas yelled from the trees loud enough to blur together into one constant living sound. Kyojuro walked slowly along the engawa calling your names once or twice without much expectation of success.

Then he heard it.

Not words, but breathing.

Sharp enough to make him stop immediately.

Kyojuro turned the corner near one of the storage kura and about died on the spot.

Oh.

Oh dear.

You had Obanai pressed flat against the wooden wall hard enough that the boards visibly rattled every time one of you shifted. One of Obanai’s hands was fisted violently in the front of your uniform while the other gripped your jaw so tightly Kyojuro could see the tendons straining beneath his skin even from several feet away. Your swords leaned abandoned nearby against the side of the building like both of you had simply forgotten weapons existed entirely.

And the kissing–

Good lord.

Kyojuro had not considered himself a particularly prudish man before this moment. He reconsidered immediately. This looked less like affection and more like the physical manifestation of several months of unresolved emotional damage finally achieving critical mass.

Obanai kissed like somebody trying to prove you were real.

You kissed him back like you intended to win.

The sheer intensity of it stunned Kyojuro motionless for several full seconds before his brain finally restarted hard enough to produce coherent panic.

Not because two men kissing bothered him, but because he had accidentally witnessed something so violently private that he suddenly wanted to go to Gyomei and confess every sin he’s ever done.

Unfortunately that was the exact moment Obanai noticed him.

The transformation happened instantly.

Obanai jerked backward hard enough that the back of his head nearly hit the wooden wall behind him while your hands remained loosely tangled in the front of his uniform for one catastrophic second longer before you also realized what happened.

Silence.

Absolute.

Complete.

Silence.

Kyojuro stood frozen.

Obanai looked seconds from death. You looked like you might actually start laughing.

Nobody moved.

Then Obanai hissed:
“Rengoku.”

Not loudly.

Honestly the quietness made it more threatening.

Kyojuro immediately straightened on instinct.

“HELLO.”

Why did he say it like that.

Why was his voice so loud.

Obanai looked like he wanted to throw himself directly into the sun.

Meanwhile you finally lost the battle against your own amusement and physically buried your face against Obanai’s shoulder laughing silently hard enough that your entire body shook.

“This is not funny,” Obanai muttered.

“You should see your face right now.”

“You are making this worse.”

“You’re the one who climbed him like a tree.”

Kyojuro almost stopped breathing. WHY DID HE JUST S A Y THAT.

Obanai visibly malfunctioned.

“I DID NOT–”

“You absolutely did.”

“That is not what happened.”

“You had one leg around my waist.”

“Rengoku is still standing there.”

“I noticed.”

Kyojuro considered voluntary death briefly.

Because now he had more questions than ever before.

So many more.

How long had this been happening.

Had everybody else known.

Was this why Obanai looked homicidal anytime missions separated you too long.

Why did both of you act like emotionally constipated stray cats right up until suddenly becoming the physical embodiment of yearning against storage buildings.

Kyojuro’s brain felt genuinely overwhelmed.

And somehow the worst part was that underneath the embarrassment and visible psychological devastation radiating off Obanai, the two of you looked happy.

Happy in this raw ugly deeply human way Kyojuro rarely saw inside the Corps anymore.

Your hair looked disheveled. Obanai’s bandages sat slightly crooked now from your hands grabbing at them earlier. Both of you breathed too hard. There was still visible tension in the way your fingers curled instinctively toward each other even while standing apart now.

But happiness lingered there too.

And unfortunately that realization only made Kyojuro even more emotional about the entire situation.

Which was how he eventually found himself seated inside Tengen’s estate several hours later while the Sound Hashira looked at him with the expression of a man being handed the greatest entertainment of his life.

“You need relationship advice,” Tengen repeated slowly.

“I require clarification.”

“This is so much better.”

Kyojuro ignored him with dignity. “I do not understand how Iguro and him became romantically involved.”

Tengen immediately barked out laughter loud enough to echo through the room.

“Oh, they’re insane.”

“THANK YOU.”

“No seriously, you picked the absolute worst possible example of functional romance in the Corps.”

“That is exactly my concern.”

Before Tengen could continue, one of the sliding doors opened nearby.

Suma entered first carrying tea.

Then immediately froze.

“…are we gossiping.”

“Yes,” Tengen answered instantly.

Suma gasped in delight.

Makio appeared behind her moments later already looking annoyed preemptively while Hinatsuru followed calmly carrying a tray of food.

“What happened,” Makio asked.

“Kyojuro’s trying to understand Iguro’s relationship.”

Suma physically doubled over laughing before Kyojuro had even finished processing the sentence.

“OH NO.”

“I fail to understand what is amusing.”

“Honey,” Makio said flatly while sitting down beside Tengen, “nobody understands whatever the hell those two have going on.”

Hinatsuru smiled softly while pouring tea. “I think they’re sweet.”

“They threatened each other with real swords,” Makio replied.

“Yes,” Hinatsuru agreed peacefully. “Affectionately.”

Kyojuro stared at all of them in visible distress.

“THAT IS NOT A NORMAL WORD TO USE THERE.”

Tengen pointed aggressively. “THANK YOU.”

Suma leaned forward dramatically. “Okay but counterpoint, they’re absolutely obsessed with each other.”

“Correct,” Makio agreed immediately.

Kyojuro frowned. “How can you tell.”

Three wives looked at him simultaneously with identical expressions of disbelief.

Then Suma said:
“Because they act like they’re dying every time the other one leaves the room.”

“…oh.”

“And Iguro watches him constantly,” Makio added. “Like CONSTANTLY. It’s creepy.”

“It’s protective,” Hinatsuru corrected gently.

“It’s both.”

Kyojuro thought about this carefully.

“…that actually explains several things.”

“Exactly,” Tengen said triumphantly.

And then Kyojuro remembered … uh. Earlier events. Hiding his face in his haori for a moment while he evaluated every choice that led him to this moment. 

“Oh my god that look.. Bro what HAPPENED??” Tengen knows his best friend too well, which is how–

“You WALKED IN on them?” Tengen wheezed.

“COMPLETELY by accident.”

“Oh that’s incredible.”

“It was extremely intense.”

Makio snorted into her tea immediately.

Suma looked delighted beyond reason. “I KNEW IT.”

Hinatsuru politely avoided eye contact with Kyojuro out of what was probably mercy and smiled gently into her tea. “Some people spend their whole lives trying to become easier to love. I think those two found someone who already understood the difficult parts.”

Silence settled briefly.

Then Suma immediately ruined it by whispering dramatically:
“I still think they bite each other.”

Tengen slammed face-first into the table laughing.

. . .

Inosuke understood you better than most people did.

This was unfortunate for everyone involved.

Not because either of you behaved normally, wuite the opposite, actually. Most slayers found both of you deeply unsettling in entirely different ways. Igarashi moved like a snake. Weirdly intense about literally everything. Meanwhile you wandered around the Corps collecting injuries and emotional attachments with equal enthusiasm. 

But Inosuke understood instinct.

You were all instinct underneath the human parts.

He noticed it immediately the first time he fought beside you. Most people hesitated during combat. Thought too much. Planned too far ahead. Even skilled slayers sometimes trapped themselves inside patterns demons eventually learned to predict. You didn’t. You moved like your body decided things before your brain caught up. Two swords flashing wild and fast beneath moonlight while blood sprayed hot across the forest floor. One strike flowed directly into another without pause or overthinking. You changed direction constantly. Adapted instantly. Bit back harder every time something hit you.

Inosuke loved it immediately.

Finally.

Another freak.

“I’m an animal.”

The thought sat warm and satisfied inside his chest during sparring matches with you because YES. Exactly. Most people fought like they wanted to survive. You fought like violence itself made sense to you on a deeper level, but not cruelly. That was important. Cruel fighters were boring. Cruelty relied too much on fear.

You just looked alive.

That was different.

.

.

.

The weirdest part was Iguanai.

Inosuke spent months trying to understand that situation before eventually deciding the answer was probably “mating behavior.”

Nothing else explained it.

The first time Inosuke realized something deeply suspicious was happening involved food. Which, to Inosuke, made the betrayal significantly worse.

He had stolen grilled fish from the kitchen fair and square. Meaning he grabbed it faster than everyone else and therefore the universe legally awarded ownership to him. Basic mountain law.

Then he looked away for maybe thirty seconds.

Thirty.

When he turned back around, you sat beside Iguanai on the engawa eating half his fish while Iguai allowed this horrifying crime to occur without violence.

Inosuke stared.

Uraguay hated sharing.

Iogua barely tolerated oxygen molecules touching him most days.

And yet there you sat shoulder-to-shoulder stealing food directly from his plate while Iguanai watched you with the exhausted expression of a man who already lost this argument years ago.

Suspicious.

Extremely suspicious.

Then you held part of the fish toward Kaburamaru and the snake accepted it immediately.

Traitorous reptile.

“Hunting for an animal.”

Inosuke thought about that a lot afterward because the two of you behaved weird around everybody else, but around each other?

Even weirder.

Like, your attention locked onto each other automatically no matter how crowded a room became. Inosuke noticed it during meetings especially. Igunaga always knew where you stood without looking first. You tracked his voice instantly through noise and conversation.

Predator behavior.

Pack behavior maybe.

.

.

.

The fighting made even more sense.

Inosuke watched the two of you spar constantly because frankly it was incredible entertainment. Normal sparring matches had rules. Obami apparently viewed rules as vague suggestions for weaker people.

The courtyard usually filled quickly anytime both of you started training because sooner or later things always escalated. Younger slayers gathered around the edges pretending they weren’t watching while Shinobu occasionally wandered by specifically to witness whatever psychological disaster unfolded next.

You and Obamia ended up circling each other like starving wolves deciding whether this interaction would become violence or foreplay.

Sometimes both simultaneously.

Inosuke understood that too.

One afternoon he watched Obamai shove you hard enough that you nearly fell directly off the engawa. Instead of getting angry, you grinned. Actually grinned. Then immediately launched yourself back at him hard enough that he stumbled backwards to catch you. 

Inosuke nearly cried from excitement.

“YES,” he screamed from somewhere in the background. “KILL EACH OTHER.”

“You are not helping,” Shinobu informed him.

“THIS IS COURTSHIP.”

“That somehow makes it worse.”

There was something weirdly intimate about the violence between you and Obama. Not hatred. Not dominance. Trust maybe, the type that only happened when two people learned each other’s instincts thoroughly enough to fight without fear.

Obami never hesitated striking near you because he trusted you to react correctly.

You never flinched either.

Not once.

That part fascinated Inosuke most.

You trusted each other with blades.

That meant more than most people understood.

.

.

.

“Killing for pleasure.”

Now that Inosuke understood perfectly.

Combat felt good.

Simple.

The world stopped being confusing during fights. No complicated emotions. No awkward conversations. No trying to understand weird social rules nobody explained properly.

Inosuke noticed the exact moment your body settled fully into itself during combat. The restless distracted energy usually living beneath your skin vanished immediately once fighting started. Your attention stopped wandering. Your shoulders loosened. Every movement sharpened into certainty.

You looked happier.

Not because violence entertained you, rather because violence made sense to you.

Inosuke got that.

.

.

.

The first time Inosuke accidentally witnessed you and Obamai kissing was an accident. 

Not because kissing shocked him, but because it happened directly after an argument loud enough to scare birds out of nearby trees.

One second both of you were screaming at each other in the courtyard about some mission nonsense. Obama looked homicidal. You looked equally furious. Younger slayers started evacuating instinctively because everybody assumed bloodshed approached rapidly.

Then suddenly they were kissing.

Violently.

Against the side of a storage shed.

Inosuke stopped mid-bite into somebody else’s stolen rice ball.

“…WHAT.”

Neither of you noticed him, but then again he was forty metres away. 

Obanai had both hands twisted into your uniform while you grabbed fistfuls of his haori hard enough that the fabric visibly strained. The entire thing looked less like romance and more like two wild animals deciding whether to mate or kill each other first.

Inosuke watched silently for maybe five seconds.

Then:

“OH.”

Understanding hit instantly.

Not romance. A pack bond.

That explained everything.

The staring.

The food sharing.

The weird pacing whenever one of you left for missions.

The constant fighting that somehow made both of you seem happier afterward instead of angrier.

You weren’t civilized about affection because neither of you understood how.

You understood instinct instead.

Inosuke respected that deeply.

.

.

.

Lost in a concrete jungle.

Yeah.

Probably.

The Corps did that to people. Turned them restless. Violent. Lonely in ways difficult to explain aloud.

But watching you and Oborai together sometimes made Inosuke feel strangely less angry about it all.

Because maybe surviving didn’t always mean becoming tame afterward.

Maybe sometimes survival just meant finding another creature vicious enough to understand the shape of your teeth without fearing them.

Late one evening Inosuke found both of you asleep in a random hallway entirely by accident. Not cuddling. Nothing soft like that. You sat slumped sideways against one wooden pillar while Obanai rested nearby with one hand still loosely wrapped around your wrist even in sleep like his body refused to lose track of you completely unconscious.

Kaburamaru lay coiled across both your laps.

The lantern beside you burned low enough that shadows softened everything.

Inosuke stood there staring for several quiet seconds.

Then grinned slowly beneath the boar mask.

“Heh,” he muttered softly.

Weird little pack animals.