Pain on pain on play repeating Who: Seiko. Marcus, Asami and Karen (NPC's) Where: Her house When: Various points during the day Warning: Disturbing content. Really.
The sound of a scream tore through the house.
Marcus's eyes fluttered open at the sound. Most people would have woken faster or been more alarmed, especially with what the news had been predicting would happen today, but he knew what today was. In this household it couldn't matter less that there were possibly demons coming if they did it today. Today was a sacred day and on it there was nothing more important than the things that Seiko did in the basement. He was not allowed to take part, but he still knew. Several years past he had forgotten the date and wandered down to ask if she needed anything only to see a sight that remained burned into the backs of his eyelids to this day. On the ninth of August it did not matter what he heard coming from the basement, he was not to go down there. He was not to allow anyone - or anything if it came to that - to disturb his sister. One of their other siblings could show up dying and still, Seiko was to remain undisturbed. Marcus couldn't claim to fully understand why she did what she did on these days, but he knew enough.
And knowing enough was what led him to roll out of bed despite knowing that he could still sleep for hours. If Seiko had begun then it was time for him to keep his watch up for anything that might disturb her. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and paying no attention to the continuing screams, Marcus padded out of his room and began to ensure that all of the windows and doors were locked. And that the phone was unplugged. The sound of it ringing had irritated Seiko once and every phone in the house had been torn out of the wall for it.
"NO!" He turned on the coffeepot and was grateful yet again that the walls were thick here. The police simply would not understand his sister. Hell, he had known her for his entire life and he still didn't understand her.
Seiko had been kneeling on the floor since a minute after midnight, her legs having passed the point of numbness hours before. Occasionally she would allow herself to spend this day in her natural form, but that was a luxury she did not always allow. This year it was not allowed because too many people had learned the truth of her nature. There was no danger from it because they were all lamia just like her, but she had still allowed it to become too known. She had sought too much contact with her species, needed too much, and because of that she did not deserve to spend the day of remembrance as one.
"I never let anyone know who I am." The voice came from inside of Seiko's own mind, but she felt like she heard it with her ears, and it stretched across over half a century. It was melodious and perfect, the voice that had sung to her and told her that she was beautiful and safe, always safe. It was the voice of her mother, Asami, and it wrapped around her like a warm blanket, soothing away any drop of worry that had dared to cling to Seiko after she descended the stairs into this self-made sanctuary. "I did that for love of you, Seiko, to protect you from the hate that would have come from villagers who could not understand the beauty of our people." It was not from Asami that Seiko had learned hatred, that had come later, from her mother she only ever remembered learning and hearing things that most people would call good. Seiko's mind constructed the feel of a warm hand stroking her cheek, going perfectly with the voice that she was hearing. The one that she only ever managed to hear on this day every year. She could yearn for it in her dreams every other night and nothing. Only today would Asami come back to her. Only when she opened the first scar on her left wrist and let the blood drip down to mingle with the scented oil and crushed plants in the bowl.
"I have no one to protect," Seiko said at last, her voice sounding harsh to her own ears. Once her grandmother had said that she sounded and looked so much like her mother. Seiko remembered how her face had twisted in disgust - it twisted now just at the memory - and that she had been slapped for her denial of the fact. No, she was nothing like her mother. They did not even have the same snake form, and if that was not the ultimate proof then she did not know what was.
"Yourself," Asami corrected and Seiko imagined that not only could she hear and feel her mother, but she could see her, kneeling before her with a smile on her face. She had been so beautiful; young and perfect and everything that she had wanted to be. So they killed children in order to live, that did not mean that Asami had not been respected in their home. As gentle a soul as the one that Seiko remembered couldn't be anything but revered and beloved by all. "You have yourself to protect, Seiko. If something happened to you then how would we live on?" There was truth in that and Seiko bowed her head in shame, fingers trembling as they wrapped around the well-worn hilt of the dagger that she'd snuck out of her grandfather's room when it had been the size of her forearm. She'd thought herself so clever, but Junpei had known what she was doing. He'd allowed it after she promised to only do it when necessary. The anniversary of her mother's death was necessary. As was that of her father and grandfather. Perhaps she should have mourned the loss of her grandmother as well, but she had not managed to claim as firm a spot in Seiko’s soul. Maybe it could only be split between three that were not her. Seiko didn’t try to keep any part of herself for herself. Why should she? She had never done anything to deserve it. There was not even an American waiting to be sacrificed for honor of her mother’s memory.
Still gentle, her mother’s voice nonetheless berated her for that. “Where is the white devil? You always kill one for me, Seiko. Do I only matter enough for the shedding of your blood now?” A voice that soft shouldn’t be capable of saying things like that. Had anyone other than Seiko been worthy of hearing it then they’d likely have not believed the things she was capable of saying. Terrible, awful things that made Seiko put bloody fingers to her ears to try blocking it out. But you couldn’t block out something that was coming from inside of your head. And so her mother's voice continued to wear at her, asking where they were, why she hadn't killed one, why the screaming wasn't happening until finally Seiko herself did something that rarely happened and let out an ear-piercing screech of her own.
She was trying her best. Why wasn't her best ever good enough for her?
"Just one, Seiko, just kill one," Asami assured her. Seiko could practically feel the fingers brushing her hair back behind her ear. "It won't be hard. You've done it so many times that you know the best way. Have Marcus get one for you. He knows how." He did, Marcus had been so willing to go along with everything that Seiko only had to tell him what she needed and she had it. If she told him that she needed an American then he'd go a proper distance away, retrieve them and then dump their body somewhere far enough away that no one would ever think of it having been her. "No one would recognize it when you're done." Asami liked the blood, the screaming, but Seiko knew enough about modern science to know that there didn't need to be any blood left in the body for them to identify. You could drain it all, cut off their skin, crush all of their teeth and still they'd likely be able to figure out who it was and where they come from. Maybe even how they'd been killed. Seiko didn't know. Seiko didn't care. If that was what her mother wanted her to do in honor of the day she had been killed then it was what she would do. Nothing would stop her.
"Okay." Smiling at the image of her mother that she knew only she could see, Seiko went to the foot of the stairs and called up. "Marcus!"
It took a few minutes and a few more shouts before her adopted brother opened the basement door and appeared. At least he knew better than to say anything about what she looked like. "Yeah?"
"Go get me someone. From some city not too near to here."
"What sort of someone?"
"An American."
"Anything-"
"Now, Marcus."
It took nearly two hours, which was two hours too long for Seiko to be seated in the basement while the image of her mother chatted at her, for Marcus to return. They talked about Yoshi and Chiho, even a little about Daichi though Seiko knew her mother couldn’t really remember him. Somewhere in her mind there was an echoing thought about how she couldn’t remember any of them since this wasn’t her mother, her mother was dead - burned up, cracked skin, blood, eyes boiled like in the pictures - but that voice wasn’t very loud. Certainly not louder than the one that spoke to her. And when Marcus called for her from the top of the steps she practically flew to them, the dried blood on her hands flecking off as she ran. “Bring it down,” she encouraged. She could not leave the basement until the next morning, and normally Marcus could not enter. But since this had been a special day and he had what she needed he could this time. Just this once. “But don’t look.”
Marcus obeyed, looking at the stairs and nowhere else as he came into the basement, the unconscious woman draped over his shoulder swinging a little. Good, a woman. Seiko always preferred those when she was remembering her mother. For her father and grandfather men were preferred. It was good that Marcus had either remembered this or just gotten lucky. Seiko didn’t care either way, nor would Asami. She was an American and alive, that was what mattered to the memory. “Go now,” Seiko dismissed Marcus and he, having known her his entire life, knew better than to argue and just turned and went. Such a good brother, that one.
Seiko may have been small in comparison to most people but she was also stronger than them and it didn’t take much effort to move the unconscious woman to the chair nearer where everything else was. A few ropes to tie her arms to the chair while her legs were bound to those of the chair and she was ready. The image of Asami settled on the floor to her right, a smile on her still-young face as she looked the woman over. “Perfect, Seiko, you know what I want.” And she did. Seiko didn’t even have to have the voice actually talking to her to know what it was after. Her mother always wanted blood. More blood, more screaming, more pain. Enough suffering to equal what she must have suffered when the bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. Face hardening, Seiko picked up the dagger she had earlier used on herself. Now it would be put to actual use and her mother would be pleased.
“Wake up,” Seiko demanded, slapping the flat of the blade against the woman’s face. She came awake quickly enough, eyes fluttering as she did. It amused Seiko to watch as knowledge of her situation dawned on her when she realized she couldn’t move her arms or legs. “But you can scream,” Seiko offered in a helpful tone, even smiling. It was amazingly hard to not smile in the face of that sort of panic. The scent of it on the air brought a sparkle to her eyes that simply didn’t exist anywhere else. But here in the basement where no one could hear the screams that she drew, here Seiko could reveal in the only things that numbed the pain brought on by the remembrance of why she was this way. “Because they killed me.” Yes, she knew that. They had killed Asami and any hopes that Seiko would have had something like a normal life. If Asami hadn’t died then she wouldn’t have been placed with her grandparents, ingrained with that hatred and then just given to a family who took her to America.
“Where am I?” the woman asked, her voice high with fear even though she was obviously trying to appear unafraid. Seiko always liked those. They tried so hard to appear brave and they lasted, but when they broke, oh when they broke it was the most exquisite display. They couldn’t shed more blood than the others but it seemed like they did just because it took longer. “Who are you?”
“You’re in my basement,” Seiko answered honestly. Yes there were ghosts and mediums and all of that these days but who trusted them enough to listen to what ghosts said? If they ever had then Seiko should’ve been locked up a long time ago. Back when she was trying to make a dead zone out of all those homeless, uncared for people. To say nothing of what they’d have done about the people she killed who had families, jobs, all of that. “And my name’s Seiko. This is Asami.” She motioned to the air beside her. To her the image of her mother smiled and inclined her head, but to the woman in the chair there was nothing but empty air. And a clearly insane woman. Holding a knife. “Do you have a name?” The question was asked as Seiko drew the back of the knife against her cheek, the scrape of the dull metal echoing to her ears. But no blood. Not yet. Asami liked to know their name first. It was why she couldn’t just keep someone around. They needed to be fresh.
“Karen,” the woman answered. Karen. Seiko’s mouth twisted. Such an American name.
“That’s a terrible name,” Seiko informed her. The knife flipped over in her hand easily and now when it drew across Karen’s face it left a bright red line from her cheekbone down to her chin. As the blood began to drip a smile lit up her face and the image of Asami giggled, clapping her hands much like a child would when they were given a treat. Blood was her treat. “Karen. So harsh and ugly. Just like you and your people.” She shook her head with a sigh and sat down on Karen’s lap, legs draped over one side like she was a kid getting ready for a bedtime story. If not for the knife in her hand, the cut on Karen’s face and the edge of terror and delight that was hanging in the air then someone looking in might have thought that she was just a large child getting ready for a bedtime story. It was so easy to see every person who had ever bullied her in this woman's face. To imagine it as one of the one's in the plane that had dropped the bomb to end her mother's too-young life. Or whoever had been responsible for her father's death. The point dug in a little deeper as Seiko's eyes flashed and Asami urged her again.
Karen was whimpering and struggling again, but Seiko knew she wouldn’t get loose. The more she tugged the deeper the ropes would dig until she’d leave herself with marks on her wrists and legs. Her loss. “Why are you doing this?”
They always asked that. Seiko made a clucking noise with her tongue and shook her head. Really, did they not have any sort of creativity? Didn’t they appreciate the delicacy of what she was doing? The same question year in and year out made her sick to her stomach. Predictable. They were far too predictable. “Once upon a time,” Seiko began, shifting so that she could draw another line, this one opposite the first so they met in the middle and created a crimson X. “There was a little girl living in a village near Nagasaki. She had a mother and a father and they were happy. But then war came and the father went away flying in a plane.” Seiko wasn’t sure if she’d actually ever known her father, or him her, but it sounded better when she said it like this. And she liked to imagine her father holding her when she was little before he went off to claim his place as an eternal hero by bombing Pearl Harbor. “He died in Pearl Harbor. So the mother was left alone with her daughter.” Another slice, this one straight down, and this one drew out more of a cry than a whimper, tears coming to Karen’s so-typical blue eyes. “They could’ve been happy, but no. The war continued. And one day… the United States made a very bad decision.” Seiko’s eyes glittered. “They bombed two cities. One of them was the little girl’s. But she wasn’t there. Her mother’d sent her away to her grandparent’s and she was spared. But the mother was killed just like the father’d been and the girl was left an orphan.” A fourth slice across and the bleeding marks looked like a little star. Seiko smiled at the sight and leaned in, tongue darting out to clean off the drops that had started to leak.
“I’m s-s-sorry,” Karen stammered out. The tears had started to spill and she was trembling. Maybe she wasn’t going to be as strong as Seiko had thought. Disappointing. “But I didn’t! I wasn’t there; my parents didn’t-”
“Shhhh,” Seiko soothed, placing a finger over Karen’s mouth and shaking her head. “You don’t need to talk. I don’t care that you didn’t take part. You’re one of them. And the only way to please her is to kill you on the anniversary. Which you don’t even remember. One would think your people would have the common decency to at least commemorate what you did to us. But no. You remember when we did what we did, but you killed so many more. So many. And not just fighters. Women, children, the elderly. No respect.” Seiko’s hand slid up to her cheek, fingernails digging into one of the cuts and tugging down. Karen screamed and she covered her mouth with her own, sucking in the air that she tried to use. When she started gasping Seiko pulled away, leaning to the side to spit the taste out. “That won’t do you any good either. But I like it when you beg. It’s the most creative thing your kind can do.” Not people. Seiko couldn’t look at Americans as though they were people because in her eyes they weren’t. They were soulless murderers who could kill entire cities with just one bomb. They’d done it before and she thought they’d do it again. At least she was stopping some of them. If only more of her people understood…
“Please don’t do this,” Karen pleaded, her voice broken. “I’ve never hurt anyone. I never will! Just let me go and I won’t even tell anyone what happened here.” It turned into wordless babble to Seiko’s ears as her mother leaned in, face still smooth as she spoke to her.
“They all say that, don’t they? But they would. They’re white devils and they don’t keep their word. They don’t know how. Honor isn’t something that they understand.”
“You don’t understand what I’m doing,” Seiko informed Karen, drawing the blade down the side of her face, trailing it lightly over her neck to the other side. Couldn’t only cut up the left side of her face. The right deserved some attention as well. No one could accuse Seiko of not treating each side fairly. “My mother died on this day and this appeases her. It makes her happy when I do this.” She smiled and nodded, eyes sincere as she began to draw the same design of lines onto Karen’s left cheek. Only it was deeper now, the need to draw more blood whelming up as the smell of it overtook her. Feeding off of babies nourished her body, yes, but it was torturing and killing the adults that truly completed Seiko. Her soul fed off of the scent of freshly drawn blood, the feel of fear overwhelming her and the pleas for mercy or cursing of her name that inevitably came. It was better and sweeter than anything she had ever tasted. “Your blood, your tears, your cries… everything that you’re doing, Karen, it makes her happy. It shows her that I still remember her pain. It shows her that I still feel pain at her loss, that I long for her to be here with me.” The more blood that she drew the more passionate her voice became, emotions seeping into her as though they were connected directly to the paint that she caused. “She can’t think that I don’t. She has to know, to see that I’m still willing to sacrifice more than my own blood today. I’m willing to give her a life.” Seiko’s shone as though with some unholy light as she dropped the knife, hands coming up to grasp Karen’s bloodied cheeks. The woman cried out, writhing at the feel of nails digging into already-caused wounds yet again, but that only caused the light to burn brighter as Seiko leaned in, breathing the air in. “Scream as loud as you can for me, Karen.”
A shake of the head. “N-no.”
Seiko’s nails dug in and she pulled down, a piece of skin trying to come along where it had caught. “You’ll scream. I promise.” Then she released her hold and slid off of her lap, licking at her fingers to get the blood off as she walked to a table only several inches off the floor. Kneeling down while Karen sobbed and struggled to get free behind her she began to hum a quiet lullaby that Asami had always sung to her. Ah, there was the box of acupuncture pins. “Know what these are?” Seiko asked as she stood, box in hand. Flipping the top off she pulled out the first pin, the silver catching the candlelight and flashing brightly for a moment before dulling. “Acupuncture needles. Normally used to relieve pain but they work so much better for causing them. If you know how.” Seiko smiled as she walked around the chair, fingers trailing up Karen’s arm and around to the back of her neck as she rounded the back of the chair. “And don’t you worry,” she murmured, leaning in so that her lips were next to Karen’s ear. She bit down hard on the bottom of her ear, the taste of blood blossoming in her mouth and canceling out the shocked cry that tore through the room. Asami let out a giggle. “I know exactly how to use them so that you think you’ll faint. But you won’t, because that’d ruin it. I like them writhing.”
“That’s my girl.”
Several hours later, once the screaming had stopped and the laughter along with it, Seiko was left kneeling on the floor in a pool of blood while she studied the tarp laid out in front of her. Asami’s image had grown fainter and now that it was nearing ten o’clock at night she was more than see-through. She practically wasn’t there at all. Seiko always hated this part, when her mother left her alone. “But you did so well,” Asami assured Seiko, her image kneeling in front of her to cup her bloody face in her hands, kissing each of her cheeks and then her forehead gently. “My Seiko. My pride. I’m so proud of you.”
Seiko managed to smile through her tears and at that, Asami faded away. The lamiae wrapped her arms around herself and curled up on her side, not far from what remained of Karen, hair sticking to the tarp thanks to the blood that was beginning to dry around her. One of her arms unwrapped and her fingers crept out until they could close around the hilt of her knife. With no hesitation she turned it around and drove it into her shoulder. Letting out a sharp hiss of air she writhed on the tarp as her own blood spilled out to join that of the American’s, mixing together almost as though they were of the same species. After a few moments Seiko yanked the blade back out and crawled over to her first-aid kit. She used no salve to ease the pain, only a simple bandage to help keep herself from bleeding to death. Asami may not have appreciated her spilling of her own blood but, to Seiko, it was the only real way to show how much she still cared. Enough to kill a useless American, yes, but also enough to give herself another lasting scar. And this one would last.
"Marcus!" she called up the stairs, finished with bandaging herself up. "Come down here and get this." No longer a person, the name was erased as though it'd never been there. It had put up a good fight though, Seiko had to admit that it'd been one of her better days and for that she thanked the soul of the recently departed. Or had it departed not so recently? She couldn't remember when the movements and cries had stopped, though they had grown quite weak after her eyes were removed. Blue eyes were really so bothersome to be stared at by.
For his part, Marcus was glad that he had a strong stomach because just the scent of what was in the basement made him want to throw up. Instead of that, instead of acknowledging that the tarp he was gathering contained what had once been a person that he'd spoken to, he pushed it all to the back of his mind. He'd gotten good at doing that when it came to his big sister. Something told him that if he hadn't then he'd be every bit as dead as the people that she took into the basement. Only she never took them. He did that part. "Done?"
"Looks that way." Seiko had relaxed back onto the floor next to the candles that were nearly burnt out. Her eyes were closed, her chest rising and falling evenly as she kept the pressure on her shoulder. It was easier now to remember what it had been like when her mother was alive, brushing her hair out as she told her stories of what her father had been like and all of the things that they could do when they went and visited their grandparents in the countryside. Things that they hadn't been able to do because Asami had been killed.
"Does it matter where?"
"No."
"See you in the morning then." The tarp was lighter than the woman had been but then, there wasn't as much to her. Marcus's stomach rolled again as he remembered the blood smeared on Seiko's too-calm face but he forced it to still. He had things to do and when morning came he wouldn't be allowed to talk about this because Seiko wouldn't acknowledge that it happened. He wasn't worthy of knowing what she did, what she saw, why she did it - past that little tidbit that it was because of her mother - and all he was left to do was wonder how his parents hadn't seen this in her when she was younger. As he climbed the stairs he shivered at the sound of singing coming from behind him, a lullaby that he often heard coming from Seiko's room.