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orange_lily“Have you ...” Weresheep cleared his throat deeply. “Have you tried switching it off and on again, sir?”
Hongo Hitsuji had been dead for six months. Plucked from his room by a figure in white (and try as he might, Weresheep still couldn't figure out who that was, although he was told it was the legendary Wiseman), he had been left on a stretch of Japanese coastline. As the moon froze in front of the sun, Weresheep had burst out of him with a triumphant bleat.
“No, I – I – I know, sir. L-listen, why don't I make you an appointment ...”
He was sweating. Sweating was never good. The office, with its ocean of cubicles and harried men and women in short-sleeved dress shirts and cheap ties, had the curious effect of amplifying every foul smell.
Go to the human world, they said. The sea doesn't beg you to kill it there. There's sunlight there. Plants grow. Plants are fun! While all these things were technically true, Weresheep couldn't help but notice that his fellow Phantoms had failed to mention the daily nine-to-five grind of the office.
Frankly, it was a more effective tool to induce despair than anything the Phantoms had ever come up with.
“Sir,” he mumbled plaintively, and ducked his head so that nobody could see the flicker of neon orange in his eyes, or the way lightning was starting to spark from his hands, “I will – I – I – will have you know that I d-don't have to put up with t-t-t-t-this kind of verbal abuse in the w-workplace.”
His hand was shaking. He needed a fix. He needed it badly.
Chiyoko was a bubbly free spirit type, with a pink kitten bracelet, and when Hitsuji had been alive he had harboured secret hopes of heroically rescuing her from her (obviously terrible) boyfriend. He'd never met the man, only seen him from afar, but he was called Yamato and rode a tricked-out motorbike, and Hitsuji had known with the deep certainty that Weresheep was sure could only spring from vast reserves of self-delusion that both these things meant he was a dick.
Weresheep had no such designs on Chiyoko. Humans were weird, it was a well-known fact, and Weresheep had no desire to find out just how weird in intimate, fleshy detail. Still, out of a kind of respect for the man who had been his Gate, his self-from-another-world, he had taken to walking her back home and occasionally making half-hearted remarks about how her boyfriend must be terrible.
(Weresheep kind of wanted that tricked out motorbike.)
And, okay, two months earlier he may have gone straight from blandly comforting her about her mother's illness, to the hospital itself to drain the old woman of mana, leaving her as a still, pale body. But he had needed a fix, and frankly, Hitsuji had been a serial killer waiting to happen anyway.
“Back to the grind tomorrow,” Chiyoko said as they reached her door, as she always did. “See you then, Hitsuji.”
Weresheep suppressed the natural twitch all Phantoms got at being referred to by their Gate's name, and smiled thinly. “S-see you then.”
The door clicked shut behind her.
Weresheep sniffed the air, sensing the presence of another Phantom nearby. Turning, he caught sight of a tall, horned figure across the road. As it emerged into the lamplight, it melted down into a human man, middle-aged, gruff-looking, dressed in a sharp suit.
Weresheep bowed low. “L-lord Krampus.”
Krampus raised one gloved hand. “Come. Have some coffee with me, Weresheep.”
In the upmarket coffee shop, Krampus ordered a coffee so absurdly complicated that Weresheep couldn't keep up with it. Weresheep stuck to a blueberry milkshake.
(So tangsome.)
“You know this woman?” Krampus asked, delicately setting a picture of Chiyoko down on the table.
Weresheep nodded. “She w-worked with my Gate.”
“Then you know how to drive her to despair,” Krampus said briskly. “Can I trust you to do so?”
Weresheep picked up the photograph, staring at it for a second. He did want that tricked out motorbike a lot. But on the other hand …
“Isn't there a K-kamen Rider around?”
“If you can call Lord Phoenix that,” Krampus replied. Weresheep swore loudly. Several customers gave him sour looks. He ducked his head.
“He'll kill me.”
“You have more immediate concerns.”
“Like w-what?”
“Like me,” Krampus' pleasant demeanour faded in a split second, replaced with snarling. A second later, the mask of calm slipped back into place, and Krampus gave him a bland, emotionless look. “Your hands are shaking, Weresheep.”
“I – need a fix,” Weresheep admitted, trying to still his hands. “I haven't even eaten a Ghoul for days. I need mana.”
“We all suffer in this place. Dragged here by Wiseman, and then cast out and called traitors for that we would seek basic sustenance,” Krampus' voice took on a hint of the snarl again, but this time Weresheep was grateful it wasn't directed at him. “Drive the Gate Chiyoko to despair, Weresheep, and when a Phantom is born from her we will hold it still while you drain the mana from it.”
Weresheep peered at Krampus again, then down at the photograph. Closing his hand, he crumpled it in his fist.
“Consider it done.”
“Explosion, please.”
A blast of fire and air flung Weresheep off the rooftop, followed by a streak of red and gold. With a flash of orange fire, the distance was closed between them, swords sparking as they landed against each other.
”Rising,” the device on the Rider's wrist announced, ”Slash Strike.”
The Rider's sword ignited with red fire, swirling, momentarily flaring blinding white. With a crash, Weresheep felt himself land on a car, the roof crumpling beneath him, the alarm blaring. He groaned and rolled off, the shards of his sword scattering behind him, smoking, a gash on his chest venting sparks.
Metal hitting concrete. Weresheep turned, one claw clutched to its chest, to stare at the luminescent red Rider. With a hiss, Weresheep tossed a dozen stones onto the ground, watching as they sprouted and grew into Ghouls. Waving them towards the Rider, he fled.
“Dude,” the Rider murmured. “So harsh.”
“Have you tried switching it o-on and off again, sir?”
Mumbling.
“That m-m-might help, s-sir.”
Mumbling.
““I will – I – I – will have you know that I d-don't have to put up with t-t-t-t-this kind of verbal abuse in the … in the ...” Weresheep groaned slightly. As the customer kept screaming over the phone, he looked down. Beneath his garish yellow tie, blood was soaking into his white dress shirt.
He wiped his brow, his arm coming away drenched in sweat, and gazed blearily out over the office. Chiyoko hadn't come in today. She had taken the day off, to visit the hospital where Yamato-of-the-Tricked-Out-Motorbike was.
His shirt was blossoming red. With a low whine, Weresheep dropped the phone down onto his desk, letting the customer scream into empty space as he staggered towards the bathroom. It was amazing, he reflected, how few stares he got. Everyone was too absorbed in their work, or even more absorbed in procrastinating from it.
He barrelled into the bathroom. There was one man already there, zipping up his trousers, swaggering towards the door with the gait of someone who had blissfully managed to convince themselves they were a high-powered businessman. Weresheep snatched him by the chin, hauling him up against the wall. The man barely had time to express surprise at the small Phantom's strength before Weresheep was drawing in a breath, sucking in the mana from him. It emerged from his skin in motes of purple, drifting into Weresheep's mouth, until his eyes went glassy and he dropped to the ground.
The bleeding hadn't stopped. Weresheep was still shaking. He leaned over the sink, screwed his eyes shut, and with a low gurgle, spat blood onto the ceramic. Motes of purple flowed out with the red, drifting away down the plug.
“You seem troubled, Weresheep.”
Weresheep looked up. Krampus was standing behind him, adjusting one of his gloves. The older Phantom peered at him owlishly for a moment. “The Gate I assigned you to. Has she been driven to despair?”
“Phoenix ...”
Krampus sighed deeply. “Finish the job, Weresheep.”
“I n-n-need mana, Krampus. I can't think straight. I'm not healing,” Weresheep said plaintively, resting his head against the mirror.
“The hunger won't kill you,” Krampus said dismissively.
He stepped forward, taking Weresheep by the shoulder and easing him around. With a low sigh, he traced one finger over the patch of blood. For a moment, a chill spread through Weresheep's chest, then faded, taking the pain with it, leaving only a dull ache. He touched his chest. The wound had stopped bleeding, at least.
Krampus stepped back, wiping his glove on a handkerchief. “Finish the job, Weresheep. Bring the Gate to despair so that a new Phantom may come to this world. Then you may have your meal.”
At least he had the tricked out motorbike.
He drove it for an hour.
It was nice.
”Explosion, please.”
Weresheep reflected, as he was flung off the top of the hospital by the blast, that deja vu sucked.
The streak of red followed, sword bursting into flame.
Weresheep considered himself lucky to escape once. Escaping twice was a miracle.
He dragged himself into an alleyway, eyes flaring orange, bleeding motes of purple magic behind him. He wasn't even surprised when he found his chin resting on a shiny shoe.
“Weresheep,” Krampus said, with an intensely weary tone that Weresheep found himself struggling to care about. “I see you've failed again.”
“I'll – a t-third time. Third t-t-t-time's the charm, right?” Weresheep protested weakly. “I just need mana.”
Krampus nodded agreeably, crouching down. “You came closer than Werewolf, Mandrake or Cockatrice before you. For all your … quirks,” his lips twitched, “I truly do count you as one of my most reliable Phantoms. You may even succeed on your third try. Maybe I could help you.”
Weresheep smiled as best he could, flashing bloody teeth. The motion turned into a coughing fit, spraying purple light over the ground. Krampus gave him a brotherly pat on the shoulder.
“Together,” Weresheep said, “they wouldn't be able to stop us.”
“Quite so. But Weresheep,” Krampus squeezed his shoulder slightly. “You are not the only one who's hungry.”
Krampus' grip tightened, crushing bone. Weresheep squirmed, trying to flee as purple light came off him in streams, flowing into Krampus' mouth, into his nose, into his eyes. With a rattling breath, Weresheep went limp, body fading into smoke.
Krampus rose to his feet, wiping his mouth, and looked towards the hovering object at the end of the alleyway. It was a camera with bat wings attached, hovering gently. “You're one of Narumi Soukichi's little toys, aren't you? Sent after Weresheep to spy on him. Take a message. Tell Phoenix that I weary of his interference.”
“Tell Phoenix that I weary of his interference.”
Soukichi tipped his hat lower, drawing in a breath. Nearby, Yuriko scowled.
Yugo stroked his chin thoughtfully. “Dude. This all totally just got, like, ten times worse, man.”
“Harsh,” Soukichi murmured.
“Totes harsh.”
Hongo Hitsuji had been dead for six months. Plucked from his room by a figure in white (and try as he might, Weresheep still couldn't figure out who that was, although he was told it was the legendary Wiseman), he had been left on a stretch of Japanese coastline. As the moon froze in front of the sun, Weresheep had burst out of him with a triumphant bleat.
“No, I – I – I know, sir. L-listen, why don't I make you an appointment ...”
He was sweating. Sweating was never good. The office, with its ocean of cubicles and harried men and women in short-sleeved dress shirts and cheap ties, had the curious effect of amplifying every foul smell.
Go to the human world, they said. The sea doesn't beg you to kill it there. There's sunlight there. Plants grow. Plants are fun! While all these things were technically true, Weresheep couldn't help but notice that his fellow Phantoms had failed to mention the daily nine-to-five grind of the office.
Frankly, it was a more effective tool to induce despair than anything the Phantoms had ever come up with.
“Sir,” he mumbled plaintively, and ducked his head so that nobody could see the flicker of neon orange in his eyes, or the way lightning was starting to spark from his hands, “I will – I – I – will have you know that I d-don't have to put up with t-t-t-t-this kind of verbal abuse in the w-workplace.”
His hand was shaking. He needed a fix. He needed it badly.
Chiyoko was a bubbly free spirit type, with a pink kitten bracelet, and when Hitsuji had been alive he had harboured secret hopes of heroically rescuing her from her (obviously terrible) boyfriend. He'd never met the man, only seen him from afar, but he was called Yamato and rode a tricked-out motorbike, and Hitsuji had known with the deep certainty that Weresheep was sure could only spring from vast reserves of self-delusion that both these things meant he was a dick.
Weresheep had no such designs on Chiyoko. Humans were weird, it was a well-known fact, and Weresheep had no desire to find out just how weird in intimate, fleshy detail. Still, out of a kind of respect for the man who had been his Gate, his self-from-another-world, he had taken to walking her back home and occasionally making half-hearted remarks about how her boyfriend must be terrible.
(Weresheep kind of wanted that tricked out motorbike.)
And, okay, two months earlier he may have gone straight from blandly comforting her about her mother's illness, to the hospital itself to drain the old woman of mana, leaving her as a still, pale body. But he had needed a fix, and frankly, Hitsuji had been a serial killer waiting to happen anyway.
“Back to the grind tomorrow,” Chiyoko said as they reached her door, as she always did. “See you then, Hitsuji.”
Weresheep suppressed the natural twitch all Phantoms got at being referred to by their Gate's name, and smiled thinly. “S-see you then.”
The door clicked shut behind her.
Weresheep sniffed the air, sensing the presence of another Phantom nearby. Turning, he caught sight of a tall, horned figure across the road. As it emerged into the lamplight, it melted down into a human man, middle-aged, gruff-looking, dressed in a sharp suit.
Weresheep bowed low. “L-lord Krampus.”
Krampus raised one gloved hand. “Come. Have some coffee with me, Weresheep.”
In the upmarket coffee shop, Krampus ordered a coffee so absurdly complicated that Weresheep couldn't keep up with it. Weresheep stuck to a blueberry milkshake.
(So tangsome.)
“You know this woman?” Krampus asked, delicately setting a picture of Chiyoko down on the table.
Weresheep nodded. “She w-worked with my Gate.”
“Then you know how to drive her to despair,” Krampus said briskly. “Can I trust you to do so?”
Weresheep picked up the photograph, staring at it for a second. He did want that tricked out motorbike a lot. But on the other hand …
“Isn't there a K-kamen Rider around?”
“If you can call Lord Phoenix that,” Krampus replied. Weresheep swore loudly. Several customers gave him sour looks. He ducked his head.
“He'll kill me.”
“You have more immediate concerns.”
“Like w-what?”
“Like me,” Krampus' pleasant demeanour faded in a split second, replaced with snarling. A second later, the mask of calm slipped back into place, and Krampus gave him a bland, emotionless look. “Your hands are shaking, Weresheep.”
“I – need a fix,” Weresheep admitted, trying to still his hands. “I haven't even eaten a Ghoul for days. I need mana.”
“We all suffer in this place. Dragged here by Wiseman, and then cast out and called traitors for that we would seek basic sustenance,” Krampus' voice took on a hint of the snarl again, but this time Weresheep was grateful it wasn't directed at him. “Drive the Gate Chiyoko to despair, Weresheep, and when a Phantom is born from her we will hold it still while you drain the mana from it.”
Weresheep peered at Krampus again, then down at the photograph. Closing his hand, he crumpled it in his fist.
“Consider it done.”
“Explosion, please.”
A blast of fire and air flung Weresheep off the rooftop, followed by a streak of red and gold. With a flash of orange fire, the distance was closed between them, swords sparking as they landed against each other.
”Rising,” the device on the Rider's wrist announced, ”Slash Strike.”
The Rider's sword ignited with red fire, swirling, momentarily flaring blinding white. With a crash, Weresheep felt himself land on a car, the roof crumpling beneath him, the alarm blaring. He groaned and rolled off, the shards of his sword scattering behind him, smoking, a gash on his chest venting sparks.
Metal hitting concrete. Weresheep turned, one claw clutched to its chest, to stare at the luminescent red Rider. With a hiss, Weresheep tossed a dozen stones onto the ground, watching as they sprouted and grew into Ghouls. Waving them towards the Rider, he fled.
“Dude,” the Rider murmured. “So harsh.”
“Have you tried switching it o-on and off again, sir?”
Mumbling.
“That m-m-might help, s-sir.”
Mumbling.
““I will – I – I – will have you know that I d-don't have to put up with t-t-t-t-this kind of verbal abuse in the … in the ...” Weresheep groaned slightly. As the customer kept screaming over the phone, he looked down. Beneath his garish yellow tie, blood was soaking into his white dress shirt.
He wiped his brow, his arm coming away drenched in sweat, and gazed blearily out over the office. Chiyoko hadn't come in today. She had taken the day off, to visit the hospital where Yamato-of-the-Tricked-Out-Motorbike was.
His shirt was blossoming red. With a low whine, Weresheep dropped the phone down onto his desk, letting the customer scream into empty space as he staggered towards the bathroom. It was amazing, he reflected, how few stares he got. Everyone was too absorbed in their work, or even more absorbed in procrastinating from it.
He barrelled into the bathroom. There was one man already there, zipping up his trousers, swaggering towards the door with the gait of someone who had blissfully managed to convince themselves they were a high-powered businessman. Weresheep snatched him by the chin, hauling him up against the wall. The man barely had time to express surprise at the small Phantom's strength before Weresheep was drawing in a breath, sucking in the mana from him. It emerged from his skin in motes of purple, drifting into Weresheep's mouth, until his eyes went glassy and he dropped to the ground.
The bleeding hadn't stopped. Weresheep was still shaking. He leaned over the sink, screwed his eyes shut, and with a low gurgle, spat blood onto the ceramic. Motes of purple flowed out with the red, drifting away down the plug.
“You seem troubled, Weresheep.”
Weresheep looked up. Krampus was standing behind him, adjusting one of his gloves. The older Phantom peered at him owlishly for a moment. “The Gate I assigned you to. Has she been driven to despair?”
“Phoenix ...”
Krampus sighed deeply. “Finish the job, Weresheep.”
“I n-n-need mana, Krampus. I can't think straight. I'm not healing,” Weresheep said plaintively, resting his head against the mirror.
“The hunger won't kill you,” Krampus said dismissively.
He stepped forward, taking Weresheep by the shoulder and easing him around. With a low sigh, he traced one finger over the patch of blood. For a moment, a chill spread through Weresheep's chest, then faded, taking the pain with it, leaving only a dull ache. He touched his chest. The wound had stopped bleeding, at least.
Krampus stepped back, wiping his glove on a handkerchief. “Finish the job, Weresheep. Bring the Gate to despair so that a new Phantom may come to this world. Then you may have your meal.”
At least he had the tricked out motorbike.
He drove it for an hour.
It was nice.
”Explosion, please.”
Weresheep reflected, as he was flung off the top of the hospital by the blast, that deja vu sucked.
The streak of red followed, sword bursting into flame.
Weresheep considered himself lucky to escape once. Escaping twice was a miracle.
He dragged himself into an alleyway, eyes flaring orange, bleeding motes of purple magic behind him. He wasn't even surprised when he found his chin resting on a shiny shoe.
“Weresheep,” Krampus said, with an intensely weary tone that Weresheep found himself struggling to care about. “I see you've failed again.”
“I'll – a t-third time. Third t-t-t-time's the charm, right?” Weresheep protested weakly. “I just need mana.”
Krampus nodded agreeably, crouching down. “You came closer than Werewolf, Mandrake or Cockatrice before you. For all your … quirks,” his lips twitched, “I truly do count you as one of my most reliable Phantoms. You may even succeed on your third try. Maybe I could help you.”
Weresheep smiled as best he could, flashing bloody teeth. The motion turned into a coughing fit, spraying purple light over the ground. Krampus gave him a brotherly pat on the shoulder.
“Together,” Weresheep said, “they wouldn't be able to stop us.”
“Quite so. But Weresheep,” Krampus squeezed his shoulder slightly. “You are not the only one who's hungry.”
Krampus' grip tightened, crushing bone. Weresheep squirmed, trying to flee as purple light came off him in streams, flowing into Krampus' mouth, into his nose, into his eyes. With a rattling breath, Weresheep went limp, body fading into smoke.
Krampus rose to his feet, wiping his mouth, and looked towards the hovering object at the end of the alleyway. It was a camera with bat wings attached, hovering gently. “You're one of Narumi Soukichi's little toys, aren't you? Sent after Weresheep to spy on him. Take a message. Tell Phoenix that I weary of his interference.”
“Tell Phoenix that I weary of his interference.”
Soukichi tipped his hat lower, drawing in a breath. Nearby, Yuriko scowled.
Yugo stroked his chin thoughtfully. “Dude. This all totally just got, like, ten times worse, man.”
“Harsh,” Soukichi murmured.
“Totes harsh.”
