Ink Stained

68: useless punching bags*

無駄なパンチ袋

Kicking a sack of sand was not helping Shin feel any better, like he'd thought it might. It wasn't easing the pent-up frustration that was building up to a breaking point in him.

What he wanted to be viciously attacking was Shinigami, but he couldn't do that – unless he hit his own reflection in a mirror until either it broke to smithereens, or his knuckles were so bloodied he couldn't think through the pain.

Maybe that wasn't such a bad idea. At least then he would have something else to focus on rather than brooding over the bleak future that looked like it was going to be cut abruptly short in front of him.

He watched her clench her jaw, so tight he worried she might snap it. "I punched something."

His eyes dropped from the emotional struggle he could see broiling in her eyes to the cuts in her knuckles. There was a small piece of glass embedded in her skin. Even as he saw her wince in pain when she tried to curl her fingers into a fist, he watched the glass slip over her blood, digging deeper.

He caught a tiny burst of the reflection of his blue eyes, and frowned. "What?"

What did you hit?

She pressed her lips tight together. He knew she didn't want to tell him.

Yet she still did. "Mirror."

He paused, tilting her hands this way and that to examine the extent of the damage she'd done to herself. That explained the silver reflection of the glass. Her hands trembled ever so slightly in his. He wondered if she was cold. Her hands were so small in his, so fragile.

"How many times?"

She looked away from his scrutinizing gaze to focus instead on the cement at their feet. "I don't – I do not know."

His lips twisted as he imagined doing the same thing to himself. Did punching the mirror help? But even if it did, he wasn't sure it would help allay the rage burning in his veins like lava. He wanted to feel skin and bone break and give way under his hands. A mirror wasn't going to cut it. His wounds would heal quicker than he could feel the pain for as long as he wanted to.

That's not what I want. Shin grumbled as he put as much strength and force as he could behind his tightly clenched fist, holding it up close to his face. I want you to know what I feel.

Too bad, Shinigami remarked cockily as he started to move forward. You know what you need to do if you want to have it out with me.

Shut the fuck up.

A snide bark of laughter. It's only a matter of time before the Mask stops working, and I can come out whenever I want to. Maybe I won't ever go back down again. Then you'll know what I've lived with for more than twenty years, Shin. Then you'll be my Makashi.

Metal creaked, groaning as the chain-links holding up the punching bag snapped. The bag tipped as it was sent flying to the other side of the room before smacking loudly against the wall and flopping to the ground heavily. The dojo he was in was huge. It said a lot that the bag didn't just land on the floor and roll a few feet away – it was launched all the way to the wall more than twenty feet away from where he stood.