tampered | Log: Complete

Current Mood: anticipatory

Log: Complete

When; August 17
Rating; V for Violence
Characters; Walter Dornez [

dark_butler] and Youko Kurama [

banditfox]
Summary; Under the influence of what might have been, a warmongering vampire and a temperamental demon enjoy a test of each other's skills.
Log;

Locating the Underground was a simple exercise. Kurama's favored commodity was information, and some judicious eavesdropping the night before had yielded a substantial reward, including a thorough working knowledge of the City and its locations. The youko made his way to the designated battleground swiftly, feeling the delicious tension of an impending challenge sing through his muscles, save for where the damage from his near-fatal encounter with a hunter twenty years prior had left his arm crippled and numb. To ensure he would have as much range of motion in it as possible when the fight began, he made a point of slaughtering two monsters who had the misfortune to come within range of his claws when he found the passageways beneath the City.

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Butler loved the Underground passages. As one of Millennium's elite, the sun did not hold the fear for him that it did for some of others, but he had no love for it, either.

Perforce, he knew the Underground well. It gave him an opportunity to work off his urges without violating the Major's orders.

Today, though, he felt a wild sort of joy in the prospect of a challenge. Kurama would be no pushover, but that hardly mattered. Live or die, it was worth it to push himself to his limits and beyond.

And he had the Major's order to consider. "Do not lose." It would be for the best if he obeyed.

He made his way through the darkness and followed the sound and scents of blood and fear until he found his opponent.

"Youko Kurama."

The last of the monsters had died before it could scream. Kurama dropped the remains of its heart to the ground and turned to face his caller. His eyes had a faint gleam in the dim surroundings, like smooth-polished ice reflecting candlelight. He made a swift assessment of his adversary, feeling for spiritual powers and finding none, but as with demons, there was no heartbeat. The man smelled of blood and death. Kurama thought he sensed the pall of the grave around him.

"A vampire?" he asked, and as he licked the claws of his crippled hand clean of blood, his expression became one of boredom. "Would you prefer to die by impalement or beheading?"

Not whole. That was the vampire's first thought in looking Kurama over. Strong, yes, as the bodies around him testified, but not whole.

The question earned a laugh.

"Do you prefer to die with your skin on or off?"

Unimpressed, Kurama lowered his hand to his side. A cold draft of air tickled the fur of his ears, and he flicked them once to be rid of the irritation. Disposing of something not properly alive should be just as easy.

"The last creature to want my skin found his mounted on bamboo scaffolding before I was finished. It might be more entertaining to try as much with you. A vampire won't succumb to such a shallow wound, correct?"

Walter laughed again. Was he supposed to be intimidated or afraid? Death held no fear for him. Pain held no fear. All there was to fear was his own weakness and he would not be weak.

"Come and find out."

Let Kurama open. He preferred not to reveal his full abilities at the offing. Where was the surprise in that?

It had been so long since anyone but Mukuro had invited Kurama to strike first that he met the challenge with muted delight. At least it was something different from the usual ill-considered attempts to put him off-balance with a sudden attack. The rose whip sprang into being in his good hand and lashed out for the vampire's throat.

A whip? How ironic. Walter's smile grew rather than faded as he swayed out of the way, seeming to barely move his feet to avoid the whip.

As a deliberate insult, he did not retaliate.

"You call that a challenge? Do better. Much better."

In point of fact, he called it a foray. This version of Kurama had retained what friends in his usual reality considered his worst habit: methodically testing his opponents' skills and habits rather than go for the quick kill. He snapped the whip back, letting most of its length trail on the ground, and smiled.

"If you insist."

The whip's thorns suddenly drove into the ground and sent runners tunneling through it to explode back into open air at the vampire's feet, a dozen rosewood spears meant to impale him.

The vibration under his feet translated into an explosion of motion. Shooting spears, a leaping vampire, a flicker of something and silence as he alit five feet back from the place where the spears had burst from the ground.

The flicker had been the barest use of his wires to sweep the ground and prune those runners.

This time, rather than offer another taunt, he spun his hands in front of himself. In this light, would the cyclone of wire that flew toward Kurama truly be visible? That would depend upon the eyes of the beholder.

It was light enough for a fox's eyes, but the speed was more than Kurama had anticipated. He didn't step away quite fast enough. A shallow, thread-thin wound opened across the back of his hand, and his brow furrowed in annoyance. The whip came back up, its cells subtly altered to withstand even the edge of the finest katana, and met the nest of wires in the air.

It was possible that he could cut through the whip even so, but he would need more room to build up momentum than he had allowed himself in the close quarters of the underground.

Well enough. Butler's eyes flared red in the dim light and he changed tactics. One hand should be enough to hold the whip in check for the moment, wires drawn through teeth to hold the tension.

His other hand spun faster, finding gaps to push wire through as simply as he had burrowed deep into Luke Valentine's flesh to find nerves to use and manipulate.

Kurama saw the attack, willed one of the seeds hidden in his hair to fall loose, and expended a small amount of youki to startle it awake. Writhing, red-skinned tendrils rushed to his defense, showcasing gaping maws where flowers and leaves should have been. The wires could easily cut through the Death Tree, but only if they survived the acid that coated its serrated teeth.

Mouths shredded and wire melted, bringing Walter's attack to a standstill. He could hold off the whip and keep the Death Tree from advancing, but he had nothing to pull out of his hat while they were at this impasse.

Another smile from the youko, cruel and satisfied. This is the tactical weakness he had hoped to find. The vampire was unable to attack from all sides, as a demon of sufficient strength could. In a way, Kurama was disappointed.

"Is this what you bring to your wars? I'm amazed that anyone bothers to come."

His crippled hand reached under the silver fall of his hair, took careful hold of a seed, concealed it as he allowed slowly building power to rouse its potential.

He didn't miss the motion, but there were other matters to consider. A tradeoff? He could afford injury to cause injury.

He let the wires slip through his teeth and released his hold on the rose whip to use those five lashes to attack directly at Kurama.

The whip shrank, reversed its growth, and coiled in thick layers around Kurama's forearm. He brought the shielded hand up, caught the wires that he could and endured the bite of those he couldn't. A moment's thought sent new green shoots to wrap tightly around the captured wires and delay them. The Death Tree wasn't positioned to take advantage of the opening, but the seed resting on the deadened palm of Kurama's left hand had no need to be close to its prey. It only required a target. Kurama twisted his right hand and the captured wires in it, hoping to rend some small portion of undead flesh.

The pull drew wire tight in Butler's hand, drawing blood the vampire barely noticed. He bled when he fought; this was nothing worthy of notice at the best of times, let alone in the fray.

Better was the tang of copper and something other in the air from the blood drawn on the youko's end.

His lips skinned away from sharp teeth. Bleed.

To Kurama, the lacerations were nothing. Pain had been the sensation of reiki tearing into him where a human's heart would have been, burning away flesh until nerve endings died and soft tissue was damaged beyond repair. What he felt now he reveled in.

"Perhaps you're worthy after all," he murmured.

Youki sped in a torrent into the seed Kurama cradled in his left hand. The energy was so strong a corona of power limned Kurama in pale blue light visible even to someone with no spiritual awareness. A blood-drinking plant of Makai unfurled its leaves. Obedient to its master's will, it ignored the blood of the demon who held it and struck the vampire with deadly speed.

Cursed as he is, Butler has no memory of fighting Karasu. Why would he have? He wouldn't have cared for or about Kurama.

The blue glow the lit Kurama was a surprise that bore little to no attention when the plant struck, bringing pain and the promise of weakness in a moment's notice.

No! Oh no, this would not do. He jerked on the wires to call them home, to damage Kurama where he held them, to cut into the plant that threatened to end this before he was ready.

"NO!

Now it was Kurama's eyes that flashed red in the darkness. He let the vampire have his wires, but only with the rose whip still tangled in them. The youko funneled more of his strength into the blood-drinking plant, rushing its growth to heighten its hunger.

"You may want to try something more prosaic. You're going to die rather soon now."

He lashed out again as the plant drained away his strength with nigh terrifying speed. He would not go down alone. He threw away concern about defense and went on a full offense, throwing himself forward into the plants to weave his way through and attack Kurama.

If he was dying, he would not die alone.

His efforts were rewarded by a sharp hiss of pain. Kurama's focus was on keeping his primary weapon secure and directing its appetite. He could only spare so much on the dying gasps of the wounded. The wires tore open his shoulder, cut deep into his calf, and drew a line across his chest, over the sunburst scar of the old injury that should have killed him. He snarled as he willed the Death Tree to wrap its thick vines around the vampire's throat and limbs to hold him down.

To call it frustrating was to offer only a pale shadow of what Butler felt. He could not, would not resign himself to death.

He put his growing weakness aside to the best of his ability and focused on doing Kurama as much harm as he could with twists and slashes of wire. His control was minimal, but so long as he had hands and fingers, he was not disarmed.

A bud had formed between the mottled blue-and-grey leaves of the blood-drinking plant. It was still small, only the size of Kurama's hand, but it meant that the meal was almost finished.

"A matter of seconds," the youko warned. He left off the attempts to pin his victim. Let the vampire enjoy his futile struggles.

Kurama stepped back, out of range of the wires and guarded by his Death Tree. As a taunting gesture, he raised his crippled hand again and licked at the red fluid that stained his fingers.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

His strength drained away in those seconds with a speed that left him wanting to shout his defiance, but he was too weak even for that.

The angry red glow in his eyes dimmed and he could not even summon the strength to voice the words his lips formed before the glow faded to nothing.

"Next time."

In that last moment, Kurama came forward and crouched at the vampire's side, demon blood falling tantalizingly close to parched lips.

"You won't be so fortunate."

He waited until he was certain that only a husk remained beneath the plant, then ruthlessly cut off its life. The shimmering scarlet flower the plant had produced crumbled, leaving behind a seed that Kurama tucked away in his hair. Not one glance was spared for the corpse as the youko quieted and reclaimed his pets, but at least he had the courtesy not to crush it underfoot before the Underground could see to its disposal.

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Log: Complete

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