Even from the outside, the air around the curtain was oppressive to the point of compressing your chest, breathing soon became a chore, the closer they got the harder it was to fill their lungs with oxygen. Coming off the Ebisu station, the path to the tollgate on route 3 had been rather quick and troubleless, the neighboring areas were already evacuated by the police by the time they crossed them. But no matter where they were, the Kyoto squad could always see the dark veil towering over the city, blending in with the lightless night sky. This cursed pitch of darkness that hid within its walls unseen terrors turned their legs into jelly, and in Mai's case, her mind was catapulted back to last year's Christmas Eve, how back then that night seemed to never end like the hundred upon hundred of cursed spirits unleashed on the city.
Her fingers trembled at the thought, her fear that a night like that could have ever been repeated, in a much more condensed scale but ever so destructive. The gunslinger occupied her mind by making a mental check of how many bullets she brought with her as the team was getting briefed by the Tokyo high principal. News from the district was sporadic, communications were down, casualties amid the assistants were high and the ones that survived reported a situation completely out of hand. The only sorcerers confirmed alive were Fushiguro Megumi and Takuma Ino, both unconscious in the medical tent but in stable condition, everyone else was considered MIA. And lastly, as if that wasn't enough, there was an exorcist crisis that required extreme caution, three Empyrean-level threats that nobody knew their whereabouts and status. Indications were clear, the targets were too dangerous to be left alive.
After the briefing, her teacher came close to her: “Remember what I told you.” she told her, Mai could only nod.
They were ready to mobilize, each one of them had a precise role to play. Momo will scout ahead on top of her broom while the rest will stay in position waiting for a signal to come, simply as that. Due to their long-ranged weaponry, Mai and Noritoshi were relegated far back, with her standing the farthest. Nothing that wasn't wrong or played an unnecessary unfairness in her book. She knelt as she laid her bag on the ground, the zipper head ran along to open the case, and one by one her rifle and revolver came to the light. As she strapped the holster to her hip, a sudden turmoil caught the gunslinger’s ears. Mai raised her head above the rail, she saw the cursed corpses forming a circle around something down the road.
Everyone rushed to the handrail, whatever was happening was however too distant to understand what was going on.
“Did they find us?” Utahime said.
“The corpses would have dealt with it already if that was the case. But something is making them stall.” Principal Yaga responded, “I can't tell exactly from here.”
Hearing this, Mai immediately took her rifle and looked through its scope. One big breath and her aim stabilized, the cursed corpses’ large frames were preventing her from a clear view but when a crack broke in between the three silhouettes, a glimpse of white fire hit her lenses.
“An exorcist.” She let the word escape her lips unwillingly.
“An exorcist, you say?!” Her teacher looked at her stunned. Principal Yaga almost gave them the order to attack, but the marksman quickly stopped him as she saw something else hiding in the exorcist’s back:
“There’s a child in there!”
~ 12 minutes earlier ~
It worked, they were standing outside the veil. Gabriele felt relief trail down his body, allowing himself to finally loosen up and indulge in this sense of freedom after escaping that, only in appearance, open-sky prison. His essence wasn’t aching up nearly as much, the concentration of cursed energy indicated there weren't any real threats around, thankfully. Even Hoshi seemed to calm herself as if she could perceive the difference in the atmosphere, too. Looking around, Gabriele noticed this part of the city was untouched by the violence yet devoid of any trace of life, just like the Fire-Dori street where he first entered the district under the curtain.
A flash of fresh pain washed over the young man‘s back. As he reached with his digits the exposed gashes stretching across his lower trapezius, the soft touch of coagulated blood sent a sting of pure fire through his system. Gabriele tried hard to keep his expression neutral, Nitta told him earlier that his back was costellated in glass, it took four minutes to extract the shards one by one but some of them were embedded too deep and wounds too narrow to be removed without the necessary instruments. He was smart enough to understand that excessive movement meant risking opening up healing injuries, flying was therefore out of option.
Gabriele put Hoshi down on her feet, now on one knee, he communicated with his hands that they would have to walk for a while.
“Can you do it?” he asked.
The little girl nodded, though, reading beyond the head gesture, it was clear as day that she was quite scared still.
“It's alright. We're in this together.” he ruffled her hair afterward, but his eyes accidentally landed on the right side of her head, the side of the surgery. Gently he guided Hoshi to turn her head leftward, it jumped immediately to his eye the absence of the hearing aid sitting in her auricle. Questions about where the cochlear was came by consequence, the child however was just as clueless as he was, perhaps it fell while they were in mid-flight, or maybe right after that crash. Gabriele let out a sigh as he palmed his forehead, things weren't going as smoothly as he had anticipated and these minor inconveniences were starting to get a bit frustrating.
Asashiro misread the annoyance in his gaze with anger. Sensing she was the one at fault, that she made the angel angry by losing her hearing aid, the child was overwhelmed with guilt, she pinched her finger and thumb together and brought them to her forehead as a couple of sniffs forced out of her nose.
Gabriele caught her just as she was about to lower her head, looking at her with a serious expression: “Don’t apologize.” He then stood, offering a hand for her to hold on. With a hint of his head, the two began their march down the expressway route, the sounds of farby sirens accompanied their steps as little by little the adrenaline in the teen’s body wore off and left its place for different sorts of aches to take over.
With each step, a new pain sprouted somewhere in him that made it difficult to walk steadily.
Gabriele gritted his teeth tight but he kept going, glancing from time to time at the kid beside him and his other hand engulfed in essence, he couldn’t simply shake off this nervousness of curses lurking in the shadows.
After making the corner, the deserting exorcist caught sight of the tollgate like an oasis in the desert, his pain vanishing for a moment under the placebo effect’s influence of a promised restoration. He squeezed Hoshi’s hand to tell her they had finally arrived, only hundreds of meters separating them from a safe shelter.
Suddenly the road quaked under their feet as three large creatures barred their path. Hoshi screamed as she rushed behind Gabriele summoned his holy fire, ready to fight. He observed these beasts, abominations with grotesque heads just as big as their torsos, decorated with inexpressive grins and bulging eyes like chameleons. They possessed multiple, girthy arms capable of snapping one’s spine with ease, equipped with protuberances resembling spikes-covered clubs attached to one of their hands. Ignoring the pain, the angel challenged the three creatures with a death glare, waving the pearly flames to whichever tried to close the gap.
“Stand behind me.” He used his thoughts manipulation on the child for lack of better options. However Hoshi, amid a hysterical cry, was too frightened to get what was going on in her head.
With their backs against the metaphorical wall, Gabriele stared the monsters directly in their eyes, had they been transfigured humans they would have already attacked, bizarrely enough the essence burned all the same which made him conclude that they shared the same cursed energy. Clones? No, none of them was the true source of this energy, they seemed… artificial. Then if there were any kind of cursed spirits this close to Dr.Ieiri, he was sure the sorcerers would have exorcized them instantly. Which means…
“Hey! You there!” A voice called for him from above his head. Gabriele swiftly looked up, finding the Kyoto third-year Momo Nishimiya glaring down at him from her flying broom.
“Sensei, civilian confirmed at the perimeter. How do I proceed?” She communicated the news through her phone.
“Is it him?” The teacher asked.
“Yes. He looks injured.”
“The child?”
“Doesn’t look like it.”
Seeing the device in the sorcerer's hands, Gabriele externalized his distress to her: “We require urgent assistance, let us through,” he demanded, “or, may the lord be merciful, I'll incinerate these fiends right where they stand!” He aimed the essence-fueled fire, flaring up its flames toward the creatures who reacted menacingly to it.
“Principal Yaga's cursed puppets are reactionary types, they won't attack if you don't give them any reasons to do so.” Momo responded before referring the situation back to the sorcerers in the tent. Minutes went by with the situation blocked in a standoff, Gabriele felt the tension course through his veins when finally the cursed corpses took a step to the side, Principal Yaga and Utahime standing right behind them. Other minutes passed and the fire in the teen's fingers refused to die, now pointed at the adults.
“Gabriele…” Utahime said calmly.
“Not now.” He said as he killed off the fire. Still with his guard up, he tapped twice on Hoshi's shoulder and let the child in front of him.
“Take us in.”
______
Gabriele's gaze was locked on Megumi's unconscious body lying on the bare cot, his head completely dressed in bandages. Shoko made him strip off what remained of his shirt, the last barrier that covered his disgusting neck, and now he was sitting on a chair with his back exposed to the chilly air. She had to take the shards off his wounds first, just as Nitta told him. Though he doubted it hurt more than anything this bloody night had in store for him. Dr.Ieiri came back with surgical pliers in her hands and she gave him his shirt back, something to bite on. When she started, the feeling of the cold inox iron penetrating his flesh, the angel's face contracted instinctively as he bit the fabric with all his might, the only instance of relief was when he heard the piece clutter against the tray before the cycle repeated. Sitting in front of him, silently watching with his arms crossed, was the principal of the Tokyo Metropolitan Jujutsu High School, Masamichi Yaga. He had a few questions to ask to the exorcist:
“What happened inside the curtain?” he inquired bluntly.
“The situation in the city has gone awry, half of the buildings are crumbling or completely demolished, we're talking hundreds if not…” his concentration broke as he hit the back of his chair with his hand, a wave of white-hot pain anticipated another clank in the tray. “Thousands of casualties amongst the civilians only. A true disaster, like London's burning in 1999.” His gaze shifted towards the sleeping child in the cot beside him, he didn't realize how tired she was until she dropped dead the moment they stepped inside the tent. Like an awful trickster, his mind replayed some of the instances of the hotel, the memory of her parents’ still bodies being chewed up left an undeletable mark, the stench of that room could make the bile travel up the esophagus of the most unflinching men.
“I'm afraid there won't be any amount of cover-up that will hide what occurred here.”
“I agree.” said Yaga, taking off his sunglasses to scratch his eyes. This night felt like several lines had been crossed, the point of no return was already far behind.
“The Empyreans then? Did you run away?”
"I left them on top of the Shibuya Stream. Rotting.”
“What killed them?” He crossed gazes with the angel for a moment, the principal remembered a peculiar glint that glowed the turquoise irides of the young man, which now had lost all its light.
“God damnit kid.”
“They had plans of cleansing the district. The entirety of Shibuya…” he groaned as another shard was extracted from his wounds, “would have been wiped off the map with every person in it. There was no choice.”
“Do you know what this means?!” The adult yelled out, then silence. It wasn't unusual to hear the principal raise his voice, Shoko who had the man as her teacher throughout her high school years grew accustomed to the sudden outbursts, but something in the pitch of his voice made her stop and look at him almost surprised. Masamichi, wanting to clear out his mind, stood up from his seat, and walked to the tent entrance.
Just before leaving, he turned to look at the angel and said: “Although your intentions were good, your actions may have led you down the path you were trying to avoid.” He put his sunglasses back on, “We'll discuss later, from now onward you're under our custody.” He then stepped out of the tent.
Shoko refrained from making any hasty comments, limiting herself to be an involuntary spectator. She watched Gabriele for an instant, he didn't bat an eye or at least he didn't give any obvious signs away, exhibiting a maturity that almost justified the tortured state of his battle-scarred body. The doctor would have paid money to know what stormed around his mind, if it was anger that burned his core, fed by a feeling of incomprehension and unfairness. Masamichi was scared of an open war with the Holy Church, she understood that much, but what he failed to realize was that said war would have arisen anyway, and if they had a fighting chance now was only because of this boy’s sacrifice. How hard it must have been, to go against his brethren and the creed that guided him for the majority of his young life. Gojou, you were far ahead of us, as always.
“Thank you.” She spoke up softly. Gabriele glanced over his shoulder and responded with a small nod as he relaxed over the chair, letting himself be at his most vulnerable by giving her full access to his back.
For the next seven minutes the doctor worked in silence, the teen flinched less and less until he wasn’t bothered anymore, his attention was entirely focused on the kid, a non-sorcerer turned orphan he found at the Excel Tokyu Hotel. They struck up a little conversation in the meantime, she would ask how they had managed to get out of the curtain, and he would respond that running into Todou was nothing short of a godsend. As the discussion went forward, a question bubbled up out of the blue: “Is it possible to cure one’s hearing through cursed energy?” Shoko imagined this question to come mainly out of curiosity as he lazily brushed Hoshi’s hair over her little ear. But she grasped this thin layer in his tone, one of hopefulness that made her wonder if it was only for her or, maybe, for himself too.
“It depends.” She said, “Reverse cursed technique is more an act of restoration than an act of regeneration. It doesn't create organic tissue out of nowhere but revolves it to its former state. However it ain't perfect, otherwise we wouldn't have scars or any imperfections had we wanted to.”
“You can figure out yourself that if something was defective from birth, it can’t be restored.” The angel did not fret to respond, rather he hid behind his arms to stare at the void with a melancholic air.
“Do you think Jesus knew reverse cursed technique?”
“That’s blasphemous.” The doctor laughed softly, even Gabriele couldn't resist cracking a smile beneath the indignant expression. The procedure continued without any further interruption, when the last shard hit the bottom of the tray, the woman cleaned the wounds with a wet towel.
“Okay, tough guy, you know the drill. In order for me to put you back in health, I need you to discharge all of your divine essence.”
She instructed the young man as she took the disposable gloves off, what she didn't expect was for him to try and walk off. I have to go, I have to go, he kept saying through her thoughts perhaps unconsciously. When she tried to reason with Gabriele, that the battle would soon be over and it was worthless to go outside and risk his life again, he told her that Todou was waiting for him at the station.
“Itadori is there. I have to… I have to…” Save him? Kill him? Confusion reigned supreme inside his mind, what would be more just?
The two ends of the tent’s entrance flapped open, the frantic turquoise eyes fled from the inquisitive stare of the doctor to a dark green gaze that matched his in intensity. For a moment everything ceased to exist for the Italian, there was no pain or exhaustion, nor cursed monsters or tyrannical demons, the city could burn for all he cared. His synapses had gone short-circuit, he didn't move in fear that one wrong step would shatter this reality as she slowly closed the gap between them. The fierce look in her eyes was so gorgeous, her short hair like a frame to her splendid portrait. Mia Beatrice, I have gone through the shadowed forest, and the scorched depths of Hell, crawled out of the Cocytus frozen waters, and went up the Purgatory mountain, now pure and prepared to climb unto the stars.
“Mai…” His mouth followed his message as if it came out of his vocal cords.
“Dr.Ieiri,” She ignored him as she walked past him. “We’re about to move out in three minutes, could you please refer that to Principal Yaga?” Mai could perceive his betrayed gaze burning holes in the back of her head. Served him right, let him simmer in his distress for a bit longer.
“I'll be sure to tell him that once he returns. Anything el-”
“Also would you mind giving us a moment?” The woman’s eyebrows immediately rose with a look of perplexity, then she leaned to the side watching a flustered Gabriele stiff as a marble statue. Oh, now that was interesting.
“Alright, I'll leave the two of you alone. If you manage to knock some sense into him, that'd be highly appreciated.” The doctor glared at the boy with a knowing gaze as she walked by, the “you're on your own” kind of gaze. When she stepped out of the tent, the moment the two were finally alone, Gabriele felt like a lump in his throat and his heart pounding in his ears. Shortly, Mai spun on her heels to face him, a few paces and she was in front of the former exorcist at arm’s distance. Her eyes were hypnotized by the horror before her, there were no squares of skin that weren’t permanently marked by the past, she had seen war veterans in her clan’s household who had lived past 80 winters and had half of his scars.
Her digits moved upwards, ghosting over the largest one, and unbeknownst to her the freshest. A nasty diagonal cut that carved his torso hip to shoulder, of a pinkish color that heavily contrasted his paleness. She glanced up at him, his appearance was awful, his curly hair was disheveled and his skin was plastered in blood and ashes.
“What happened to you?” she asked rhetorically, knowing the answer all too well.
Then she moved to his neck, his bare neck. Instinct kicked in immediately, the angel put a hand over his throat to conceal it but she caught him just in time.
“Don’t hide from me.” she pleaded as she gently pried his fingers one by one off his neck. Gabriele gave her a bit of resistance, not entirely comfortable with the whole ordeal as ghosts of the past whispered in his mind, the voice of his mother prominent over the others, yelling insults and profanities. It was overwhelmingly unbearable but once his grasp was forced out, the noise ceased altogether. The ugly truth of his deformed throat was unveiled for her to see. He looked down expecting to find a horrified glance, instead, he found himself to be encircled by a pair of arms in a tight embrace, her face pressed against his chest.
“I'm sorry,” she uttered, “I stopped the moment you started panicking. I shouldn't have forced you to show me.”
It was quiet for a while, Gabriele took his time to steady his breath to a more controlled cadence. Then gradually he moved his arm around her frame, reciprocating the hug. They didn't know how much time had passed in that embrace but honestly, they didn't care in the slightest, it was their world and both of them didn't want to ruin it with useless commotion. However, if it was one thing they didn't have was time.
“Please don't go.”
“You know I'm needed. My classmates rely on me.”
“Then let me come.”
“Look at me.” Their gazes locked together again like magic, her hands capturing the sides of the boy’s head. “Nobody will be angry at you if you stay here and heal. Nobody will blame you for this mess of a world we live in. You’ve done enough, you’ve the right to rest.” She pressed her forehead against his, the same way he did that night in her moonlit room in Kyoto.
“You don't have to do everything alone anymore.”