Ink Stained

25: circles*

取り巻く

"Kouta, are you high?"

"No."

"Did you drink too much saké?"

"Last time I drank saké was with you, Haru, and that was a month ago."

"Did you fall and knock your head during training?"

"Yuu, that was you."

"Are you senile?"

Kouta gave Kaede an impassive look. "I am twenty-six years old. Next time you call me senile, I'll set you on guard duty."

Kaede shrugged carelessly, clearly not taking heed of Kouta's words. "That's not so bad. Karasa-kun's cool."

"He isn't in charge of the kids." Kouta deadpanned. "You'll be."

Kaede winced. The kids got loud when any of the Daitengu took over babysitting duty to watch over them, as occasionally happened when everyone else was too busy. Then it was impossible to get them to sleep when they were supposed to. Not to mention, all the kids wanted to do with the Daitengu was play until they get tired, and they often had too much energy from their excitement even for the Daitengu.

The only good thing that came from any Daitengu being on babysitting duty was that the kids were knocked out for hours afterwards.

"But this is an insane plan." Ryosuke pointed out. "You have to realize that this is insane, right?"

"I know."

"No, Kouta, this is insane. It's going to – we're going to kill Shin. We can't do this," he pressed.

None of them could ignore the subtle tinge of desperation colouring his words. His almost unnervingly pale blue eyes were intense, and all the more obvious for the dark circles under his eyes. Pai didn't think he'd slept a wink since his brother's disappearance; he was the most affected by Shin's loss of control over his Makashi.

Her hands tightened in the sleeve of her haori over Shin's Mask when Ryosuke gestured expressively, and she caught sight of the white sash tied around his own wrist.

It was the day after the conversation she and Kouta had outside Ayashi House. It was snowing heavily outside, and all the windows were shut with the heaters turned up to keep everyone warm (mostly for the humans). The Daitengu – all seven, excluding Shin – were gathered in the convalescence room.

Haru was sitting up on his bed, with a glass of quickly cooling hot chocolate by the nightstand table on his right. He had woken up with a sudden craving for chocolate – everyone was used to Haru's 'sudden cravings' by now – and had already been through thee mugs of hot chocolate. This was his fourth.

It seemed like a lot, but that was normal for Haru. Pai was glad to see Haru's incurable sweet tooth hadn't been affected by the miasma that so subtly hung over him.

Everyone had pulled up chairs in a semi-circle around Haru's bed. Kouta sat in the middle, much as that could be in a circle, with Daichi, Shouta, and Jirou to his right, and Kaede, Yuu, and Ryosuke to his left. By the time she had gotten there, all the seats were taken, so she sat with Haru on the bed, at the foot of it with her back up against the wall. Her legs were drawn to her chest and her arms wrapped around her knees, trying to make herself as small and unassuming as possible. She was pretty sure that if she stayed still like this, unmoving and quiet a a mouse, they would all probably forget she was even here.

She was hoping for that.

The Daitengu sitting to Kouta's right were the most silent of everyone in the room. From the varying degrees of how deeply they were frowning, she knew that neither Daichi, Shouta, or Jirou were particularly inclined to agree with Kouta's plan. Pai didn't understand what was wrong, but she was nervous to interrupt ask for an explanation.