"Bat! Come down here please."
My eyes flicker open, staring vacantly up at the ceiling before I crawl out of my hammock. I do not enjoy being waken from slumber, especially when I'm hungry. A glance down at the ground dashes my hopes of food. It's one of my other handlers, and Eyebrows. I had quite forgotten that they wanted him to have little bonding sessions with me. Apparently I would be functioning as his partner while on their team, since the creepy thing was already partnered with the older guy. I wonder what happened to his last partner...
I sigh, slowly making my way down to the lowest bar. My muscles are stretched out on the way, so I'm mostly awake when I reach my destination. My handler regarded me with a distasteful expression before leaving with a swish of her long brown hair. That one doesn't like me very much.
Eyebrows seems a bit nervous at having been left alone with such a dangerous creature such as myself. His hand twitches in a motion that could only be a habitual reaching for his quinque, but it's outside the room, likely being held by the security guarding the room. Outside is their problem, inside is mine.
"You're frightened of me."
My voice is exactly as it should be. The voice of a gangly young man, still fresh out of puberty with a masculine voice. It holds wisdom, yet also a childlike curiosity. He starts, taking a step back before giving me a determined expression and walking over to the little sitting area.
"I am not. I'm only.. disturbed."
"Because you've been told that all ghouls eat humans? Because I break that fundamental rule? I care not for those humans call 'my kind'. Would you call a sandwich your kin?"
"I.. suppose not."
He falls silent, sitting in the same armchair he did last time. It gives him a good view of me. Or maybe the room...? Who knows. My thoughts wander elsewhere, and it's not long before I find myself hanging upside down from the pole, arms crossed in thinking. It's common for me to end up like this. Part of the multitude of reasons they call me 'Bat'.
"What are you doing?"
My eyes open, crimson irises flickering to meet his wary and curious face.
"Thinking."
"About what?"
"The behavior of ghouls, the tendencies of the human population, when my next meal is, what should I do to occupy my time, why they've brought you here, why the brown haired woman doesn't like me, how does human food taste, the usual. Why do you ask?"
"I was curious."
"Humans usually are, though that isn't to say I'm not myself. Curiosity killed the cat, but the cat has 9 lives and 9 kittens. 18 divided by 6 is 3, 3 sides to a triangle, 2 triangles make a square. Do you see what I'm getting at?"
"Umm... No."
"Good, because it's nonsense."
"Oh..."
He falls back into silence, eventually look around the room. Minutes pass, 10, maybe 15 before I sense it. The familiar feeling of a strong prey nearby. Yet it's outside, rather than in.
"Strange..."
His eyes flicker back to me as the word leaves my lips. I fall to the ground, the crunch of my arm breaking ignored as I stand up. It heals with a snap as I walk over to the huge window that covers an entire side of the room. It looks down on the city, lit up in its nightly glory.
"What is it?"
I glance over to see that he's stood up, probably in response to me suddenly being on his level. My eyes go back to searching the cityscape before I see it. The blurred, pulsing shape that stands perched upon the the corner of a skyscraper, staring at me with hungry eyes.
"A rival of sorts. To you, a Kakuja. See, he's over there, on the building with the screen where the fish swim."
The words are barely out of my mouth before one of my handlers walks in, clearly in a hurry. He hands Eyebrows his quinque, before turning to me. The words are barely out of his mouth before I'm being covered in my kagune. Both parts this time. The usual rinkaku covers my entire body, hardening into an inky purple. It's always been my ukaku that I've been proud of. It grows from between my shoulder blades, longer and longer before unfurling into large wings. Leathery, featherless wings, black with bright purple and red pulses. Alive.
"Bat. Have a nice hunt."
My handler hits the switch, the window collapses in on itself, opening like a door. The Kakuja on the building screeches excitedly, while my four eyed mask only blinks at it. As if being shot, I fall out of the building, plummeting towards the ground at breakneck speeds. I don't care. The night feels cool, it being my cloak, my disguise from prying human gaze. With a snap, my wings unfurl once again, flipping me and halting my journey towards becoming a bloody puddle. My fall has confused my rival, his head moving about as he searches for me. With a beat of my wings, I land behind him, opposite his position on the skyscraper. He turns, sees me.
The chase begins.
My blood races with excitement as I leap nimbly from roof to roof, the sound of his screeching and noisy landings following me as I head far from home. It's better if I look like the CCG was holding me captive, rather than being their pet.
I forgot how fun this was~
>>>>>>>>>>>>
"Why'd you let him go?"
The handler looks at the confused man before sighing. His gaze turns to the two dark shapes quickly disappearing into the city, watching them completely leave his range of sight before replying.
"You are aware of how we feed him, yes?"
"By taking the bodies of the ghouls to him after collecting their kagune for quinque development, right?"
"Yes... However, he's a bit particular about what he eats... He dislikes the females, and refuses to eat children ghouls. Therefore, we can only bring him male ghouls to eat. The teams currently taking care of cases with suitable prey for him have not yet succeed or have been delayed. So essentially, we've had nothing to give him for about a week. It's easier to let him kill his own sort than harbor a starving Kakuja."
The handler glances over to see the man deep in thought, staring off towards where the two ghouls had disappeared into the inky darkness. He watches as he turns around, sitting back in his seat.
"You're free to head home; he'll take a while to return."
"No... I'll wait here."
"I see... Let us know if there's anything you need."
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Kakuja's don't exactly battle one another. It's a very complex, instinctual interaction. Our need to eat and eat more is ingrained within our bodies. However, the feeling of eating and being eaten at the same time trigger other instincts in a strange way.
The instinct to breed. In plain words, our sexual desires build up while we're idle and explode all at once while feeding or interaction with another Kakuja. It is this instinct that is the only reason I let them throw me to the floor in an abandoned building and get on top of me. I can tell it's another male by scent. He reaches towards me, only to have his arm in my mouth within seconds, being eaten while still attached to its owner. It's other hand slides to my hip, beckoning for me to release my kagune to it can have it's way with me.
However, I've always been the sort to never share my own body with anyone. Before they can so much as open their mouth, my arm is through their chest. Their mask falls, and crystal blue eyes looks at me clearly before glazing over in a lifeless stare. I kick them off of me, sitting up and crawling over before beginning to eat my fill.
I never leave anything behind. It takes me hours, tearing, chewing, swalling, over and over the cycle goes. But this time, I stop before I finish. An image of Eyebrows flickers over my vision, and the sudden urge to purge fills my body. One arm wraps around my abdomen, the other clamping over my mouth as my body lurches a bit. I can't remove it from my body, I just can't. It's food, it's natural to me.
So why.... Why does my body reject it?
A glance at my victim explains it. They look very similar, he and Eyebrows. Similar but not the same. I return to eating, ignoring the small protests of my digestive organs. Once their body is finished, I eat the marrow from the bones, gnawing on a couple in a feral manner. But once they're nothing but a pile of empty bones, I get up, exiting the building and returning to the CCG. I brought the mask back as a present for Father. He always praises me when I do that.
Am I good boy? I want to be a good boy. I ate him all, no trace of myself left behind. Aren't I a good boy?
As I land nimbly inside, a giggle slips past my mask. The window slides down behind me, closing me in. Shades cover it once it's firmly on the ground, blocking out the light of the barely rising sun. But my enthusiasm fades as I force myself to settle down, releasing my kagune and returning to normal. I drop the mask upon the short table in the living space, trying to forcibly persuade my body to stop wanting to puke.
"You're back."
My gaze flickers to where Eyebrows remains. His expression tells me he was dozing before I returned. He looks a bit entranced when his gaze meets my own.
"I didn't know your eyes were blue. It's nice."
I blink at him briefly before my gaze turns to the ground. I shift my weight a bit, my face feeling a bit warm. Odd, am I running a fever?
"Thank you. Why are you still here?"
"I wanted to see what you were like after... Eating."
I see now. After eating, we are the most human, our urges satisfied and personalities free to express themselves.
"I'm sleepy is what. I also feel sick... If you'll excuse me, I think I'm going to... never mind."
My face contorts a bit in discomfort while I speak, only fading as I slump to the ground. I hear him get up, my breath just short puffs. I think... something was very wrong.. with that... Kakuja..