tampered | Log: Complete

Current Mood: expectant

Log: Complete

When: July 16, evening
Rating: T for violence (will bump up rating if it becomes necessary)
Characters: Walter Dornez [

dark_butler] and Karasu [

lethalcrow]
Summary: Walter feels like hunting, and a certain crow provides a convenient target.
Log:

There was something about lurking near Kurama's apartment at night that excited Karasu. Perhaps it was the possibility that he would hear something from the apartment below--a word, a whimper, a crash as something was knocked over in the throes of a nightmare. He had no intention of attacking, not yet, but it still thrilled him to imagine what might be going on behind those walls.

Tonight, his imagination was somewhat distracted. He knew that another of the kitsune's associates intended to deal with him. What he did not know was how, and that heightened his adrenaline in a completely different manner. There would be blood. That much Karasu could be certain of. He smiled behind his mask as he waited, hands tucked in the pockets of his long coat, his black hair a fall of ink-stained spider silk down his back.

It was good fortune indeed that he'd been brought to the City. Very good fortune.

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There were times when he lusted for violence. Not just blood, but violence.

It wasn't vampirism; it was the peculiar way he was wired. Walter had earned the nom de guerre Angel of Death when he was human and it wasn't just because he was good at what he did; it was because he was good at it and he loved it.

Now, he went to find this Karasu who had harmed Kurama. Not because of tender feeling per se, but because Kurama had, in a twisted, not altogether rational way, become part of Walter's family when Arthur had sealed him.

Now he searched the evening for the stalker, sorting through heartbeats and heat signatures and faint tastes of minds until he found the figure he sought.

"Karasu." His voice cut the air with quiet precision. "I believe we have an appointment."

"So we have," the crow agreed, though he did not turn to look at Walter just yet. His gaze was fixed on a particular window crowded with greenery. He indulged his fantasies for another moment before he drew away. Violet eyes narrowed as he regarded the one who had come to fight with him.

"My my ... and here I thought he couldn't do much worse than that orange-haired fool and the agent of Reikai. At least the Forbidden Child has a jagan to his name." Karasu sighed as though disappointed, but in truth he was curious. What kind of power did the vampire possess that he was so confident in challenging him?

Walter was not the target he sought, was not beautiful or fragile enough to ever be worthy of special attention, but he brought the promise of violence, and that was welcome. If they happened to damage a few other lives in the course of their encounter, Karasu honestly didn't mind. He'd be thrilled.

"You are a fool," Walter said almost genially as he approached, shifting from the semblance of a man in his so-called "golden years" to that of a black-haired man in his prime between one step and the next. "To judge solely on appearances."

He gauged the man - a demon according to Kurama and bore in mind what the kitsune had told him. He moved well, had a good reach, and still wore the mask Kurama had mentioned.

Walter grinned and his teeth were sharp, more than a pair of dainty fangs. "But I would expect little more of one who moons around as though lovestruck."

His scowl in answer to Walter's words was hidden by the mask, but the youki Karasu summoned to his hand was a clear threat--if Walter could see it. "You know nothing of what I am, and you know nothing of him."

The energy that surrounded his hand condensed and formed a small, glowing green orb of pure power. He hoped that Walter would not be put off by the coming display. That little trick with the shift in form was impressive in its way. Walter still wasn't quite his type, but he did like what he saw.

"Let me show you," he said before he hurled the bomb in the vampire's direction.

Walter's eyes narrowed as he watched Karasu's hands. He could sense but not see the energy the demon summoned, but the throwing motion was obvious enough. He leapt high into the air, attention divided between his opponent and the space where he'd been standing, observing this first volley to judge the speed of the explosive.

In retaliation, silver flicked out, cutting chunks out of the wall to hurl at Karasu. Just an appetizer. Something light to whet the palate.

The crow was already moving. He ducked the pieces of wall with speed that would have been difficult for a human to follow, the shape his next attack already forming in his mind. Explosives manifested at the front and on either side of Walter, set to go off as soon as they were touched.

The wires would prove to be problematic. Unlike Kurama's rose whip, they were difficult to follow, and that made them difficult to target from a distance. Karasu would foster no illusions that he could disable them as easily as he would a more obvious weapon.

Again Walter could sense the energy, and while he cursed his inability to see the threat, he also grinned - a feral baring of teeth - at the challenge and the opportunity to develop a new skill in the crucible of combat.

Faster now, he dropped into a crouch and sent out a lash of wire, targeting not just Karasu but the wall behind him to create brick shrapnel.

Some of the shrapnel found its mark as the line meant to hit both the wall and Karasu drew most of the youkai's attention. With a hiss that was partly pleasure and partly rage, the crow tucked into a roll that spared him further damage. He shook the dust and debris from his coat and hair when he stood. "Not bad," he praised as he summoned one of his favorite weapons. "Let's see how fast you really are."

A dozen bombs, each equipped with wings and rudimentary intelligence that would allow them to track the vampire, swept through the space between them, rigged to explode the moment they drew near enough to their target.

Energy. It was hard to track when Walter's eyes insisted he should be able to see what he sensed. The vampire leapt to ricochet off a nearby wall to try to buy himself space, but bought himself nothing but a second's more time and confusion as he tried to sort what he knew was there from what he could see.

Finally it was the instinct that would cut bullets from the air that guided his hand, casting a net of wire that caught most, but not all of the missiles that seemed to track him. The one that made it through the gauntlet followed Walter as he twisted away and threw him backward with the force of the concussion when it hit and exploded.

Fun. Walter rebounded from the blowback and sprang forward, racing toward Karasu with a speed that turned his movement to a bare blur.

Karasu tried to push away, his own speed impressive by youkai standards, but Walter had startled him. The vampire's reflexes were better than the crow had anticipated ... much better. Karasu hadn't seen anyone twist away from his tracking bombs so efficiently since the youko.

He laughed as he called more explosives to him. If Walter wanted to deal with him at close range, he would be happy to oblige.

Walter was starting to catch on to the trick of tracking the energy Karasu summoned. He could tell that the demon had more of his explosives at hand, but he hadn't gathered enough information about his opponent and his fighting style to feel ready to try a final strike.

He spun a funnel of glinting silver ahead of himself as he closed on his target, an effective, and deadly shield.

Several explosives detonated on contact with the wires. Karasu ignored the shrapnel that the blasts produced, his concentration instead on maneuvering his bombs in the hopes of producing maximum damage to Walter.

This meeting was more exciting than he had hoped for. The vampire was easily as capable a fighter as some of the more formidable youkai in the demon realm, and he was clever.

"Did Kurama tell you that he was so desperate to be rid of me he was willing to kill himself? Is he so desperate now that others must take his place?" Karasu queried conversationally as he reached up and removed his mask. His smile was now visible. He drew in a breath, and his hair become yellow gold as his youki spiked.

Walter shrugged off the shrapnel as though it hadn't touched him, regenerating such minor wounds as though they had never existed in the first place.

He was pleased to see the mask come off, pleased to see the demon taking this seriously now. His eyes narrowed slightly as he felt the power grow, making the prior displays clear as what they were, diversions and toys, in comparison to what he felt now.

But why in Hell would he let Karasu exhale?

The funnel broke apart into a glinting cats cradle meant to catch the demon in its center and reduce him to the chunks he'd promised Alucard.

Once Karasu had drawn breath without his mask, it was too late to keep him from using the volatile elements he had pulled into his body. The cats cradle cut deep into his flesh, but even as it did so, Karasu detonated a powerful explosion, using himself as the trigger.

Walter was flung back by the blast, wire strands snapping under the force. He landed in a crouch at a distance and kept his head down before he rose, wiping blood from his mouth.

It was an irritation to Walter that he'd still not gotten his form under control enough to keep it from reverting to that of his teenage years when he was injured. It was a tell, but no one so far had caught on to what it meant.

He smiled though, to smell Karasu's blood in the air as well. A little blood, a little pain, and his enemy's fear, and he'd be good as new.

"Is that as good as it gets?" he asked, stalking forward, wire circling him in an ever-shifting shield. "A little bang?"

As he walked, he reached out for Karasu's mind, seeking a hold to open the demon to fear.

In Karasu's opinion, the blast should have killed Walter. He was more than a little put out that it hadn't. The vampire's subsequent shift from the form of a mature human man to an adolescent was perplexing, but Karasu spared no time to consider the cause. Still, he found that the youthful features endeared Walter to him more than violence alone could. The blood was a nice touch as well.

Perhaps the kitsune had chosen his company well after all. Perhaps they were worth more attention than Karasu had thought. Perhaps--

Then he felt it. The vampire was in his mind. Karasu snarled in outrage and summoned more airborne bombs, directing them at Walter in vicious waves. "Kisama," he hissed between his teeth. He coveted control, and the vampire had threatened that precious commodity. For the first time, Karasu doubted the outcome of their confrontation.

Yes. Walter felt that seed doubt and seized on it, working to feed it, to make it bloom into true fear. Most of his attention was on his opponent, but he spared enough to pull a large piece of debris into the air and shred it into smaller pieces to throw up a curtain for the airborne bombs to fly into.

The damage he took from shrapnel of his own making was something he could afford to shrug off, small wounds healing almost immediately and larger wounds hidden under the illusion of clothing.

At first, Walter's influence was hardly discernible. Karasu continued his assault with the same single-mindedness he displayed in choosing and breaking a toy. Someone familiar with his fighting style might notice a hint of unusual tension in his stance, a shift of focus from accuracy to intensity, and the absence of sadistically imaginative attacks.

The more Walter fed the crow's doubt, the more unfocused Karasu's tactics became, until the youkai was relying on sheer power without any artistry whatsoever. Get out, he thought frantically. Get out get out get out.

Mine.

Walter mouthed that word with malicious glee on his face, pressing his attack now, not just defending, snaking wires past the barrage to try to get cuts in. He didn't try for deep damage. The taunt of smaller cuts would do more damage on the psychic level, feeding Karasu's doubt. He wanted to demon to taste full-blown fear.

He would count that as victory no matter how else this fight turned out.

Another snarl was his answer, accompanied by an angry flare of red in Karasu's eyes. This was not the way battles were meant to unfold. Only Toguro had ever claimed superiority over him. Kurama had survived their battle, yes, but he had still lost in the end.

With his concentration unraveling, Karasu found it difficult to evade Walter's wires. They cut deeply enough that the wounds didn't heal immediately, and more blood dampened the crow's clothing. He gave up on strategy entirely and threw all of his youki into generating explosives that targeted the vampire where he stood.

Karasu loathed the creature, now, but most of all he loathed the fear that he was going to lose.

Unlike Karasu apparently, Walter understood what it was to lose and he understood the desperation that preceded loss.

He hoped he was seeing it now, because that build of energy directed at him was going to be a challenge to survive.

Fear me. Fear me. Fearmefearmefearme.

The air was full of silver and explosions and debris and Walter was almost chanting the words, Fear me as he destroyed what he could, dodged what he could not, and took burning wounds from what would be neither destroyed nor dodged, feeling the pain starting to grow as he was not given time to heal and the sustenance from Karasu's fear was still meager.

There was too much silver, too few explosions. Karasu was bleeding freely, all of his youki now gathered into a single, suicidal bid for victory, but what was suicide when you were already dead? Without life, the only thing Karasu had to lose was himself.

Damn you, he swore. Get out of my head!

They were only words ... useless, ephemeral, weak. He was afraid. He remembered what terror was--not his victims', but his own. Unless he destroyed Walter, now, he would break.

Karasu was rigid as stone as he compressed all of his power into one final explosion meant to eradicate the vampire.

There.

Walter drew on Karasu's fear to heal himself, drinking it down and feeling the vice grip of pain loosen.

And there was the desperation.

The power built and burst toward him and it was all Walter could do to crouch and use all his strength to throw himself high into the air, away from the concussion, away from the conflagration that would tear him to pieces.

Even that was not enough to escape fully, the concussion and blast catching him and throwing him against a wall hard enough to leave an impression in the brick.

If Karasu had had any usable youki remaining to him, the moment Walter collided with the wall would have been the moment to strike with another conflagration. He had none, not even enough for a spark. Bloodied, exhausted, and shaken, the crow could rely only his claws and his reflexes now.

Karasu knew that if Walter could still stand, he was finished.

Walter pulled himself slowly off of — and out of — the wall. He could feel bone grinding against bone as it moved itself back into place and knit with other shattered pieces, and it wasn't exactly the most pleasant sensation.

On the other hand, he was still healing, and there was no silver or holy magic to slow his regeneration.

And Karasu still fed him.

Walter pulled himself straight, met the demon's eyes, and smiled before throwing himself forward, a wave of silver preceding him.

Karasu's defense was wild, desperate, a blur of long red claws and rushed blocks that didn't always work. He wasn't smiling anymore. His eyes had lost the lurid glow of a demon trapped and fully prepared to fight. The absence of the mask allowed Walter to see the grim, fatalistic line of Karasu's lips as the crow tried to hold him off.

Like many youkai at his level, Karasu was a practiced martial artist, but against Walter it wasn't enough. One wrong step, and he fell to his knees.

Walter's lips drew back from his teeth in a sharp smile of triumph, but having Karasu on his knees wasn't close to enough. Silver wire spun a web around the demon, Walter intending to bind his foe.

The wounds Karasu had already suffered burned as the wires pinned his arms. He struggled, infuriated at being taken prisoner for the second time since his arrival in the city, but succeeded only in creating new wounds as the wires cut into him. Fear was evident in his voice as he swore at Walter in every dialect he could call to mind, using the filthiest insults of the demon realm in a pointless show of defiance. The crow struggled to find his feet, unwilling to let Walter simply take him.

Walter didn't want Karasu to rise. Mostly because he was too short as he was to be able to do what he wished if he allowed the demon to his feet. The vampire relished the taste and sound of his opponent's fear, fed from it, letting it flow through him like an anodyne for the pain of his injuries.

He wanted more.

Walter kicked Karasu in the back of the knee to keep him from gaining his feet and leaned in behind him. "You lost," he murmured, ignoring the curses and insults. "And now I have you."

He knew how this felt. Knew it and knew how someone who was unfamiliar with defeat would loathe this weakness.

Walter wanted one thing more from Karasu before he would be satisfied. He wormed his way deeper into the demon's mind, dredging up every particle of fear he could touch and whispered, "Scream for me."

Karasu hated Walter. He hated him for being unafraid. He hated him for winning. He hated him for everything that he was. The crow tried to build on that hate and nurture it. It was a better emotion than fear. Its purpose was clearer, deadlier. This trembling that Walter forced him to feel was sickening, and as his knees struck the pavement again, Karasu strained against the wires like a maddened beast in a net.

Walter could demand what he wanted. Karasu told himself that the vampire wouldn't have it, but his mind was approaching a state of debilitating panic. He could feel the vampire clawing through his consciousness. The invasion was beyond anything Karasu could have imagined. His resistance crumbled.

When Walter commanded a scream, the crow gave it to him.

Walter took the scream and drank it down. It filled him and healed him and it was a heady draught indeed.

After the scream faded, Walter started to withdraw from Karasu's mind then stopped.

"I will come for you if you harm Kurama or those close to him again. I will come for you and next time, I will keep you and this will be as a pleasant dream in comparison."

He released Karasu then, withdrawing from his mind and releasing the wire from his body.

~~Isn't it lovely to play someone who's vicious?~~

Stripped of his power, at least for the time being, Karasu collapsed where he was. What strength he still had his body funneled into repairing the physical damage Walter had done. He had no answering taunt, but even as his weary mind dragged him into unconsciousness, he grasped at a single cherished memory: a human body draped in red, flesh torn away in time with its screams.

~~Quite.~~

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Log: Complete

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