[ dextera doesn’t even wait for everything to come to an end. he can maintain his purification for a while, but he can’t do it while he sleeps and ice will melt in time.
once he’s back in godsblood, safe away from anyone who might have seen him in venera, he withdraws his shard.
the message he sends makoto is a bit unlike his usual—he’s still skittish, afraid of being caught. rather than words, dextera conveys a series of impressions and emotions. it’s all in images like a montage: the guard he chose, the murder itself. dextera’s heavy breaths and his own hands carefully extracting all he can find in tact. he particularly lingers on the heart, savoring the way it continues to beat for some moments longer than the person himself has lived. in dextera’s memory, shown to makoto through this, the color is a bright and unnatural red.
he’s careful about the way he sets it aside in his mind, and with all those thoughts given, dextera knows makoto will understand. ]
I have something for you. When you have time…
[ as if there wasn’t a battle between their factions. ]
( when dextera's message arrives, makoto doesn't reply. this is because he had been in venera the day before, and after having been plucked from the clutches of the Innocent entity by the Regent themself, he'd spent a few tidy hours suffering a torrent of concentrated anguish, despair, and futility being tossed back out onto the floor of the Regent's audience chamber. though the whole experience has done much to inflame and focus his feeling of purpose, he was exhausted physically, mentally, and emotionally from the ordeal of fighting estinien, then the Innocent, and then enduring all that, so... he'd only just managed to haul himself to his quarters and stay conscious through cleaning up and sewing shut all of his wounds before passing out for roughly twenty-four hours straight.
so it's late on the 25th of soviseri when he wakes up and sees that dextera has contacted him. that realization comes with a twined feeling of anticipation and worry. had something happened to him, or was he just checking in on him?
what he witnesses when he accesses the message is quite outside what he had expected. his rapt and wide-eyed fascination sharpen into something intent and craving at the images of actual violence, portrayed through Communion with the phantom voyeurism of the perspective from dextera's eyes, tinged on all sides by the presence of his feelings, of his own personal fixation. besides the shriveled animal one that dextera had given him all those months ago, makoto has never eaten a heart — when contracted to J, he had ripped him in half and started with the lower one, and from there he had never gotten so far as his entrails — but he does understand the appeal. it's been a thought that's crowded into his mind dozens of times. tearing past the flesh and cracking open the ribcage to expose what lie within, holding the demon's still-beating heart in his own hand so he could feel that he owned it and controlled it both literally and figuratively. so his attention lingers on that still-beating heart just the same as dextera's does; when the images fade and words replace them, makoto's formerly still waters have been thoroughly agitated, stirring up so much sediment that had settled to the bottom that they were now opaque and turbulent.
there are logical qualms. he's still very much on the mend from the injuries he received, and they're still standing in the threshold of conflict between their two spiritual sects.
but how the hell is he supposed to say no to all of this?
his first response is actually a laugh, a sound as breathless and wry as his response. ) And here I've been thinking on how I might repay you for what you brought me in the caverns... You beat me to it.
( in his quarters, still holding his shard, he sits up in bed. some of the pain might filter through their connection — deep lacerations encircle his torso like an embrace, even if they are neatly sewn shut — but it doesn't stop him from moving. )
[ dextera understood the initial delay, considering their circumstances, but he’s surprised to feel pain in makoto’s response when it comes. he had managed to keep away from the thick of it all, more out of self-preservation than cowardice, and while he didn’t escape unscathed, his wounds aren’t so deep that he can’t continue his daily activities.
and when he does partake of this morbid feast he’s collected for himself and makoto both, he’ll be perfectly normal again. the proximity to life will restore him in ways no magic spell could, and even if it isn’t the same for makoto, dextera understands there’s value in it nonetheless. ]
…
[ dextera still begins to inquire whether or not makoto is okay, but he stops himself with the acknowledgment that he’ll find out soon enough what makoto’s physical condition is like. ]
I don’t want anyone else to see.
[ in other words, they need to choose their meeting place carefully—a given, perhaps, but also an indication that dextera feels some shame and anxiety over the gesture despite committing to it enough to arrive here. ]
( there isn't much that makoto can be grateful for, with regards to this body of his. so similar to the one that he'd had when he was human, naturally without any of the fearsome features that one might associate with devils and demons. sure, he had cut out his own tongue and replaced it with a slightly more curious one, and he had stitched kieran's wings into his own back, but in the grand scheme of things he was still painfully human in the eyes of any demon in hell. the one thing he can say it's good for, and especially here in horos, is putting itself back together. he might not have the eternal and immortal nature of a demon body anymore, but so long as he can reattach any pieces that might have gotten chopped off or sew up any marring flesh wounds, he can heal from most trauma within a few days of low activity. this will probably take a few more days, sure, but he's far better off than those that would otherwise require the attention of a dedicated healer.
he will be able to teleport, he will be able to move, but... dextera's concerns might pose a somewhat thorny issue. )
I don't believe I'm in any state to fly, Dextera.
( not without running the risk of opening up all of his wounds while in midair, perforating like a plastic bag... )
If you have any thoughts on where we might meet, it would need to be close to one of the shrines.
[ it’s that bad. dextera will have to ask what happened when the time comes.
he’s silent for a moment, weighing his own fears against makoto’s health. there’s no point in offering a gift that he might have to withdraw just because he’s afraid. he knows for a fact there were various portals set up to span the continent during the events of the past two weeks, but he’s not so unwise as to reveal the pleroma’s side of things to makoto. simply inviting him to find his own way to godsblood, however, can’t be all that much of a problem.
it’s stupid, though, and so he hedges his bets. ]
Is the Lover Shrine too hard? To get back from?
[ he doesn’t wait for makoto’s answer. ]
I know some of you didn’t use a ship to get to Godsblood… if there’s a way for you to come here… I can…
[ he falters, but at least communion carries the rest of his implication through; dextera will not expect makoto to walk right back into the heart of godsblood, but his months spent in the city means he knows a few secluded spots outside of it, unguarded, that dextera can hide them away in. ]
( he has his returning stone from several months ago, when it had been given to him to help facilitate in bringing new Aion recruits to achamoth. it has charge. so long as he is alone and undisturbed to use it, secure in similar concerns that he's not inadvertently being a security risk to his sect, it shouldn't be an issue returning to the cold, echoing caverns beneath the citadel.
he can understand the trepidation of simply going back to the lover's shrine. it had served its purpose for their first meeting, but others could teleport there just as easily as they could, and if there were any Aions that were dissipated in these last few days, they would potentially need to be taken back there to recover. makoto is similarly unenthused by the idea of being found, both because he doesn't exactly try to make his highly unusual and taboo proclivities publicly known, but also because he's not in a state to defend himself against a sudden attack.
mention of godsblood prompts a defensive prickle from makoto. still, he gleans the meaning from dextera's request — he doesn't expect him to walk into the lion's den, a place that makoto currently has no idea as to the present state. had the execution been carried out? he would have to hear from someone else. regardless, just as wary as he is of a location with moderately high Pleroma presence, he's just as wary of tipping his hand as to where the portal that eustace had set up was located. even if dextera might not use that information, someone else might — he can't be convinced the Regent is the only creature with the power to pluck out memories of use and interest.
because this is dextera, and because he offers such a fine gift, he compromises: ) Show me where we might meet, and I will tell you if I can make it there. ( it's not as perfect or clever as he would have wanted, but at least it makes it vague enough as to where the portal might be, either within or outside of godsblood proper. )
[ it is often dextera’s concern. he’s made a few miserable treks with his own lack of flying ability, and even the lodestone is a pain to use when charged due to his inability to swim. asking makoto to make any similar journey is beyond him for that sympathy, so he’s grateful that makoto offers a potential compromise. though it feels like a given, as all their meetings before, that they won’t discuss the politics of their alignment, the caution isn’t insulting. even the greatest trust in one another could serve as an exploitable vulnerability for someone else. ]
…I took a bath.
[ dextera remembers to relay this information before he distracts himself trying to conduct a mental map of their meeting place.
the place he chooses is a small wooded area on the outskirts of godsblood. it’s not good for lumber compared to the dense forest next to the syraku shipyard, and godsblood itself is much more thoroughly equipped for fishing than anything the small bay could offer. with the knowledge comes dextera’s mild but sincere conviction that they won’t be discovered. ]
( ...if he had known how much of an abominable pain it was for dextera to get home, he probably would have been amenable the first time to meeting him elsewhere... but, then again, dextera had requested that as their meeting place.
in the receptive openness as he waits for a location, he can't help an obvious lilt of amusement that escapes him at the interjected comment. one colored with abject fondness, and he mostly keeps the faint condescension out of it. )
You remembered. I'm glad.
( though, honestly, given the "gifts" that dextera is bringing, makoto might have made a singular exception in this case.
the location is outside of the city, just as the portal that eustace placed is. it's not that it's close, but it's not egregiously far either. he's certain he could make the walk, but he will likely have to walk an additional distance so he can appear to arrive from a different direction than the one pointing directly to the portal (just in case).
still. it's doable. ) It will take some time, but I should be able to make it there. Perhaps - in two or three hours' time?
[ dextera can maintain the freshness of the meat for a little longer still. they won’t be sticky-hot and steaming from the body anymore, and they haven’t been a couple days now, but they would be more than enough to satisfy dextera on a descent to the bottom floor. it sickens him when he thinks too long about it, how comfortable he’s gotten—how necessary it’s become—with this disgusting aspect of himself, but his body craves it to the point of aching after the way he’s strained himself the past week.
those thoughts do filter through, whether he intends it or not; it’s like catching the background noise of a phone call someone forgot to hang up on. then their connection ends, as dextera places his shard back in its rightful spot.
it doesn’t take him as long as it will take makoto, and as such, he’s comfortably settled in the designated spot by the time that makoto does arrive. true to form, there’s no sense of taste and he didn’t bring anything but the bag he initially smuggled the offal out of venera with. back to a tree, he cradles it like a child, pulsing his purification into it to keep it as fresh and true to itself as he possibly can. ]
( makoto surprises himself with his self-restraint — with a clever enough tongue he could likely convince J to surrender to him the occasional pound of flesh to satisfy his desires, and yet he doesn't. even before he'd arrived in horos he hadn't devoured any part of the man since he had demanded his tongue from him in return for the hard work that he had been doing working part-time at datenshou's brothel. this is, of course, on purpose. makoto has seen the slouch that demons fall into, their ambitious drive made dull by the mundanity of luxury. decadence is no whetstone to keep a person's mind, words, and actions sharp. in a way he has denied himself purposefully, manipulating his expectations so to motivate himself by the single great payout at the end of his quest for revenge. something about J is like a drug to him, and so if he ate his fill whenever he wanted, what would that revenge matter to him after a time? wouldn't he just become accustomed to what he had?
so, no. he keeps his attention focused on his ultimate goal. he tries. though it's no guarantee that he hasn't cheated on this, up until this point.
and he is obviously eager to do so again.
so the sensation of craving that dextera passes along is one that makoto understands, but the one that comes along with it, that feeling of shame and disgust... it's fortunate enough that it's all vague, but he still gets the sense where those feelings originate from. that, to him, is irritating. it reminds him of when he was human, warped with self-loathing and so much it often interfered with the contract he had signed — a sort of distracting noise to keep him from indulging in a single heart's desire he wanted fulfilled before the stain of his existence was wiped clean from the world.
for now, he doesn't say anything about it; he simply allows the connection to terminate. but perhaps he will, one day.
it is indeed several hours later when makoto approaches the spot that dextera had indicated. he comes from a direction roughly seventy degrees west of where the portal was situated, just in case, and he moves slowly, carefully, and stiffly, especially when it comes to any bend to his torso.
he pauses when he sees dextera, and his attention sharpens to an electric point as he notices the pulses of energy he sends through the bag. his hackles raise. he recognizes that energy, and it's not a pleasant memory. )
What are you doing to it? ( he can't help the thread of accusation that weaves through the words. he doesn't have the context for how long ago that murder was, and he hadn't gone so far as to consider how dextera might have kept the organs from spoiling. )
[ dextera understands makoto’s defensiveness every time it arises, but it’s always hard for him to remember what kind of pain this power has already put makoto through. except in the most dire situations, he refrains from using it in the targeted way he’d attacked makoto what feels like a lifetime ago, but he has so many little things he’s come to rely on his purification for that its true fearsomeness often gets obscured by dextera’s habit of mundanity.
he stops when makoto calls out to him, though to his credit, it’s not with any guilty haste. he’s just distracted by the question, and he doesn’t want makoto to worry. ]
…
[ there’s a long moment where he tries to figure out a good way to pantomime rot, only to come up short of all possibilities. the more obscure the concept, the more difficult it is to convey.
he sets the bag aside and raises his palm, spelling out a word for makoto’s benefit rather than getting out his shard just yet. ]
( that power had been as corrosive as acid to a creature like makoto, his soul already irrevocably warped as it was from his transformation into a demon (both literally and figuratively), but there now also was the factor of the abyssal quality that had been sunk into its depths as well. simply seeing that strange energy makes him bristle and puts him on the defensive. because dextera is dextera, he allows him to explain, pale eyes following his finger to read the word traced there.
well... yes, he supposes based on the information that dextera had shown him, he didn't have any idea when that had all taken place. if he could use that ability of his to keep the organs from spoiling, he supposes... that's fine. he has earned enough trust to take such an answer at face value. )
...Alright. If you say so.
( his raised hackles slowly lower, and he approaches, pausing a few paces away. there's an animated aura about him, both agitated and excited, nervous and raw. he's developed a sort of codified procedure with J about this sort of thing — it's been a few years, after all, but typically any flesh the demon gave up to makoto was a reward for something he'd done for him or some challenge he had successfully perceived and managed to overcome. but what they had was something altogether different... it manages to peel past all the layers of self-assuredness that makoto had enshrouded himself in when creating this demonic persona of his, piercing down to a more apprehensive, uncertain core that has existed since he was still human.
what... does he even do or say in a scenario like this? he's eager — perhaps too much, so much that he feels like it might rattle its way out of his rib cage — but he forces himself to stand with dextera, somewhat tense, searching for whatever the fuck someone would say at such a time... )
Why... ( he couldn't help be curious, but he can't seem to find the right way to phrase the question, ) Did you just want...?
( it's not as though they've discussed it, let alone at length or in detail. he's felt at the general nature of their kinship, but he doesn't know... what it is to dextera, what it means to him? what kind of world does he come from, and what relationship if any did it have to it? he doesn't need all the answers, especially if dextera is unwilling to give them, but he can't stop from being morbidly curious. )
[ dextera doesn’t usually see makoto like this. he’s learned a few different aspects by now, so the unusual side doesn’t surprise him, but he does note that makoto is capable of a face that is neither twisted in anger or flashing some cold superiority. the edges are softened in what seems to be genuine curiosity.
hesitant to make makoto take out his shard just yet, a request he has for a time after they’ve both satisfied themselves, dextera continues speaking only in the words he can find a way to communicate. he brought his notebook along just in case, but with makoto, it feels more important to him to answer from more than just a list of phrases he’s pre-written. there’s a personal connection in telling makoto letter-by-letter. ]
Hungry.
[ in that small, unassuming word, there are layers. obviously the hunger is of a different kind than dextera might feel daily; he satisfies himself from one meal to the next with normal food, even leaning toward vegetation over the array of meat available from hunting and fishing, but there’s only so long he can last before his body needs this.
conflicted by his own nature, the look in his eyes is fleetingly guilty when he answers like that. it only smooths out when he turns it back on makoto, picking up a thread from one of their earliest meetings. this rare thing they have in common. ]
( to many, it would seem like the obvious answer. he pauses for a long moment, searching for an optimal way to explain himself that simply doesn't come to him. )
In a way...
( but it doesn't sound all that convincing when he says it.
to makoto, though... there's nuance to it. to him, there has never been a sort of survival component to this. whether he was on earth or in hell, his needs were met regardless. he could draw a relatively simple distinction between the baseline desires "to eat" and "to fuck" and feel that they were two entirely different things, but this... this fetish of his was the gray area in the middle, tearing away elements of both and piecing them together into something very nearly impossible to explain. in a way, yes, it is a sort of hunger — just as one might hunger for one's attention, for their touch, for the taste of their mouth, he felt the same, it just... progressed further. it mutated, it grew teeth and nails, it took on elements of control and possession; to hurt or to maim or to kill has never really been the driving force of his fixation, but he couldn't deny that seeing the pain that it caused only heightened his excitement. he thinks back to the month he spent contracted with J, and he can't really recall ever going to the man as if expecting a meal (not in any way besides colloquially or coquettishly, he supposes). it had always been to satisfy a morbid desire, to achieve a type of sexual satisfaction he couldn't find anywhere else.
in a way, this situation is altogether different. the organs, removed from the corporal context of the body they'd been taken from, cleaned and sanitized as they are now... this might even be an altogether different sort of thing than what he's used to just based on those factors alone. starting to sense that difference makes this even more difficult for him to parse, and therefore makes it next to impossible to explain, even as dextera looks on at him imploringly.
he's never had to explain this to anyone but J, and he had safely side-stepped the worst of that by simply forcing the man into a contract before he knew what he was agreeing to. the weight of dextera's attention brings about a very uncharacteristic flush to makoto's complexion. embarrassed. he can't believe he's fucking embarrassed, but he is. ) It's - more complicated than that, though. ( unspecific and not useful. )
[ dextera accepts makoto’s answer with both gratitude and grace, even if makoto himself seems unsatisfied by his explanation. ‘hunger’ doesn’t entirely encapsulate the way dextera feels, either, even if it’s the only word that can describe the sensation that sits in his stomach. he craves not just flesh, but life, a deep need that’s been impressed on so many after the events of the blaze. it’s the worst for dextera, though, a reluctant acknowledgment that god has changed him.
straddling two existences, the only thing dextera can do to maintain his corporeal body is consume. and when he’s fixated on that, his own body’s presence in the real world, it isn’t all that strange that emotional wires would get crossed in ways he can’t explain to many people. ]
…
[ he nods. his natural silence allows that simplicity without judgment.
then, he withdraws the spoils one delicate revelation at a time. the intestines, the liver, the heart—dextera hadn’t been lying about keeping them fresh, each of them still flushed and warm as if from the body, though with no twitching pulse of tissue the way they might be truly ripped from a torso.
( he would think that it would change the whole equation, if it was something he needed to do — if his body would break down altogether due to some deficiency that required such a thing to satisfy. while prior to his death he did fear that it might one day become a compulsion that might force his hand to act in a way that he didn't necessarily want to happen, that had never ended up being the case. for him, it's simply... fixation. fascination. all of that, extending to the point of becoming a fetish. given that it's all selfish and meant for personal gratification rather than any other deeper or metaphysical meaning (not that he can put into words, anyway), he would draw an obvious delineation between himself and anyone who found themselves driven to requisite cannibalism.
regardless of those differences, however, dextera doesn't comment or question. instead he removes the contents of the bag and places them upon it, and even with the display of them so separated from the body that they had come from, he can tell that dextera really has kept them far fresher than he might have imagined — makoto can't help but think back to how J had looked when he had first torn him apart on his bedroom floor, the pale white of bone peeking through bloody viscera and entrails still pulsing with life where the flesh had been ripped away. he had been — it had been so...
without him noticing, his breathing had started to pick up, his heart beating away at a clip inside his chest. he takes a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment to regain his composure.
when he opens them again, ) I would hazard a guess as to your favorite.
( it's not just that a heart had been what dextera had brought him all those months ago in the cavern. it had been obvious enough to infer from the memories that he had sent him through Communion as well — the feverish haze of violence had seemed to tunnel vision on the heart as it throbbed in its place in the chest, in the palm of his hand. he's still... guessing out the etiquette of this sort of thing (would dextera even have something like that?). given that he had procured their little "feast," it seems rude to makoto to reach first. )
[ besides the communion itself, makoto’s directed attention to the heart gets the first real pique of interest from dextera, who had up until now been as calm as collected as one could be with a sack of organs. his throat bobs with some suppressed response, but the swallow that comes after is obvious as anything. he presses his thumb against his bottom lip, digging the blunt nail into his own soft flesh in an attempt at composure, and he nods. there’s just the slightest metallic tang still on his skin that he can taste.
yes, the heart is his “favorite.” ]
…
[ when he had shown makoto initially, the blood of the body had kept the organ bright red, hot with life, though the time that’s passed and dextera’s cleanliness seems to have taken some of that immediate crimson away from it. for better or worse though, there’s a little trick that dextera has learned from the more human meta-beings—the aries, nicl and nicr, all once living people themselves before dextera’s selfish mistake turned them into little more than livestock—in order to keep his meat as fresh as possible. the heart is surrounded by a thin membrane; the thickest part of it was removed when dextera properly eviscerated the body, but there’s still a layer around it now, protecting it from things it has no idea are no longer a concern.
withdrawing his hand from his lip, dextera takes the heart to his mouth. his eyelids are half-lowered, his attention evidently focused in wide pupils. then, he sinks his teeth into that pale membrane and peels it away with a visceral rip. he takes tissue of the heart itself with the movement, and the disturbance brings with it a gush of blood that had been kept safely inside the sac. inevitably staining his sleeve, red runs down his arm and his nostrils flare in response to the iron scent of life. there’s a reason the heart is his favorite, no matter how long it took him to come to this conclusion.
lips now wet with the blood he’s released, dextera breathes an open-mouthed sigh across the organ… and offers it to makoto, a gift after all. ]
( the intensity of his interest is something telegraphed so loudly that it might be lit in neon lights, so easily causing makoto to recall the feverish and impassioned frenzy he was thrown into when his blood had dried on the contract between himself and J and sealed both of them into its terms. he likes to imagine he is more controlled, more refined about his unconventional desires by this point, and perhaps he is, but it's more by force of will and not any change or transmutation in who he is.
so dextera nods, and he accepts this scrap of information about his friend with a sort of reverence, still not quite believing that he is here, sharing this sort of moment — he had always accepted that his indulgence in something like this would be a lonely and alienating one, regardless of how gracious and accommodating his demon master was to his needs.
makoto watches on in awed, breathless fascination as dextera reaches out to the inert yet warm heart, bringing it to his mouth so that he could sink his teeth into it just so, hooking onto the thin membrane of interstitial tissue that had once protected and separated it from the other discrete parts of the body that it shared. he tears away that layer as one might shuck the husk from an ear of corn, though by the nature of animal over plant, it does so more messily, loosing a small gout of blood that runs down the length of dextera's arm, staining his sleeve dark red. he wouldn't have been able to tear his eyes away even if he tried. the copper scent of blood fills the air, bizarre in its twisting nostalgia. makoto has to suddenly clench his jaw and grind his teeth, shifting in place where he crouches to the ground, unable to either attribute words or know how best to process the truly bizarre experience of watching someone else do such a thing.
but rather than proceed with the fruit of his spoils, dextera instead offers it out to him. makoto pauses for a moment, thoughts temporarily wiped clean, and then he reaches out to accept it mutely. his fingers slide across the surface of the organ, slick with blood still warm. he can't help his hands from shaking somewhat. even if it's different, the context and the overall meaning, it's just been so long —
he brings the heart to his lips and opens his mouth, lips drawing back from sharpened teeth and inhumanly long, curving canines. they sink far more easily into the flesh of the organ than his human ones might have, and he pauses for just a moment to savor the feeling of preserved vitality in his hands, the roundness and fullness of it even as he tears a part of it away. and then he does so, biting off the mouthful and then chewing. it's tougher than he might have imagined. the heart, a tireless muscle, was so different both in texture and taste from what he'd eaten before; the metallic taste of blood is almost overwhelming. but still, a wild and restless energy overtakes him, building up to the point where it threatens to overflow. he tries to keep it down, but his breath rattles as he fills and empties his lungs. he swallows, and it is different — not so rote and perfunctory as eating a meal to satisfy mechanical hunger, instead going deeper to seethe as a twisted and pervasive warmth in his blood, enraptured and lowly demanding of more.
he speaks with a tongue thick with affectation, ) I'd never tried the heart before.
(how would J's taste? blood smears his mouth; it runs down both his bottom lip, his chin, his scarred throat, and both of his arms in cooling rivulets. it's not that he doesn't want to take another bite, to tear into the thing until there's nothing left, but — he doesn't. instead, he reaches out to hand the rest of it back to dextera, and he continues, anticipating his resistance, ) Don't argue. I'm grateful to have tried it, but - it means more to you than it does to me.
[ dextera has seen the twisted ones eat. longneck had begged for a heart, just like this—something he had hoped to plant and flower in his delusion, but he had been unable to stop himself from devouring it just the same as everyone else. and even so, it’s different for dextera, different for even makoto. these are not desires brought about by insanity at the end of the world.
for dextera, the gore of it all is proximity to god. for makoto… well, he doesn’t entirely know, but he can begin to guess at something from the sight in front of him. ]
—
[ he’s so enraptured by the stark contrast of colors—white teeth and skin, black hair, the carmine splash of blood—that his breath catches upon being given back the heart. true to makoto’s anticipation, he moves to deny it, but it’s done in barely more than second. as soon as he’s given real permission, dextera is greedy in the way he takes it.
despite offering, there had been some envy in watching makoto eat something as rare and beautiful as the heart. he won’t give it again, now that he knows he doesn’t have to share. it’s in this second indulgence that he can really open up; his usually glassy eyes seem to gain life, as if every second he isn’t consuming is a slow march to an end. everyone is bound to die, it’s inevitable, but going without this pushes him along faster than most. though his aion body has kept him alive even as he’s denied himself in horos, he needs it. he needs this, tearing piece by piece until his hands are empty and he has only the blood left to lick. ]
Mm…
[ he exhales an urgent little sound, neither a complaint nor a whimper exactly but more like a reflex to desire, as he takes his own sleeve in his mouth and sucks the blood off that too. his skin is newly flushed, hot with color for the first time in months. ]
truth be told, it would be bizarrely comforting to makoto that that's what it symbolizes to dextera. an interesting, refreshing, and altogether backwards sort of conception, or at least from makoto's perspective. but he would want to believe in something like that, as twisted as it was. when bending to these desires of his, he had always felt the furthest away from the conception of "God" that he had built when trying to picture the divinity that was damning him for what felt outside of his control. that guilt had plagued him far worse when he had been human and alive — he had held onto J's body in a feverish embrace, tearing strips of living flesh away from him, and all the while he had pressed mumbled apologies into his skin and peppered him with questions, "does it hurt too bad?" he had still had the decency to feel conflicted for finding pleasure in the pain of others. he had still thought it best to end his life when what gave him the most satisfaction could only be satisfied when someone was either dead or would die very soon.
he can sense the resistance at first, but he can also plainly see the release in his self-control as soon as makoto gives him full permission. he doesn't mind the brusqueness with which the heart is taken back from him; actually, a corner of his bloodied mouth tugs upwards in a smile as he watches him take it back with such force and fervency. whether or not he noticed dextera's plain envy, it didn't really matter; it was clear to him that this, for whatever reason unique to dextera, held special significance, and so he didn't mind at all giving it up to him. he pauses, rapt in his attention as he puts off reaching for something else to watch his companion instead. dextera's mien has always been a dull one, alternating blank and blunt, but he can see the fire and light and life in him as he tears into the heart with an intense sense of need. watching him do such a thing, especially with such stark imperative is — well. his eyes have lidded half-closed, and he exhales a long, slow breath from parted lips, even as dextera is certain to not waste even a single drop of blood.
he flushes red with color as well, and turns back to what remains. he begins to reach to the coils of intestines, but then he pauses, a bizarre and singular laugh leaping into the back of his throat. )
...In the past I'd done this with a fork and knife.
( it was bizarre, he knows, but that's how it had been. utensils, soy sauce, ponzu. J, torn asunder on his bedroom floor, entrails spilling free from where he'd torn him in two; heat, blood, pulsing through every part of him. he would fall to him in a passion that verged on desperation, filling his mouth with whatever part of him he could; he would bite, chew, and swallow, and he would feel the demon's hand running through his hair— not having sampled every part of the body, makoto couldn't necessarily say for certain he knew them to be his favorite, but it was the offal of the human body that always brought him back to his most powerful memories of the time he spent contracted with J.
he finishes reaching out to them, looping a length of the entrails around two of his fingers before drawing them up to himself. his heart is beating faster and faster; he is trying to maintain his composure as best he can, but it's more difficult to hide his breath, coming in quicker and more ragged. he pauses, reaching out with his other hand to mimic the same motion, pulling free a separate length of the guts and offering them to dextera.
as with the heart, he wants him to try with him.
with that accomplished, makoto raises the entrails to his mouth. he hesitates for just a moment, swallowing visibly, and then he opens his mouth and takes a bite. even with all of his jittery apprehension and excitement, he doesn't show the same forceful voracity that dextera had. it's been — years. he hasn't been able to do something like this in four or so years, not since he had bitten J's tongue out of his mouth. he wants to appreciate it, to enjoy it. he allows the offal to fill his mouth, soft and still warm with blood and life, and for a moment he keeps it there, pressed against his palate and the flat of his tongue. but... perhaps he's not so disciplined as he would like to believe. his breath hitches, and his teeth shear the bite away from the whole; he chews, blood and juice filling his mouth, and a small sound lifts from the back of his throat before he swallows it down and continues with far more focus and drive, the cadence of his eating sometimes slowing in moments where he seems to appreciate and savor something for a beat before continuing — until the moment that the intestines, between the two of them, have all been eaten, or he is very nearly full from his ravenous attack on them.
his blood moves through his body in what feels like a slow yet urging crawl, thick and inexorable; where before the flush of warmth and color had been like a brush across his cheeks, a faint indication of his being flustered, now it colors his face more earnestly, pooling in the hollow of his throat and burning in the tips of his ears. even with his best efforts to control it, his breathing is thick and affected; feeling embarrassed to be like this around anyone else but J, he curls inward to himself a bit, drawing his knees closer. he hadn't really thought about this part, so excited to be in the passion of the moment that he hadn't thought about what it might feel like to feel so... precariously exposed to someone he already got the feeling did not have the same exact relationship to this particular act as he does.
he is at least... trying to deal with it as much grace as he possibly can. trying to calm his breathing, slow the urging of his blood, and just... wait it out. )
[ in the same way makoto has never focused so much on the heart, dextera has relatively less experience with the entrails. they’ve never served quite the purpose for him that the rest of the body does—it doesn’t thrill him to bite into them the way that it does to eat a heart, or even to sink his canines into the thick, firm flesh of a thigh. if he thinks of it as a gift from makoto, though, the point of view refreshes what he might have otherwise dismissed as unpalatable. he takes the offered line of meat, testing the new weight of it against his palm, and he follows makoto’s lead in consuming it; though it isn’t a first for him, makoto’s little quip—or perhaps just an honest statement to cover the mess he might make—encourages dextera to fall a step behind as makoto figures out the best way to treat the meal.
less interest in the offal means more interest in makoto himself. though dextera stuffs his mouth with the gusto of a man who skipped breakfast, fingers slipping past his own lips to keep the heft of the meat secure inside as he chews, his eyes inevitably remain on the person he’s invited here to partake. ]
…
[ remain, and remain, up to the point that there’s nothing else dextera could distract himself with anyway and he can only watch the line of makoto’s body as he shifts to protect himself. dextera assumes at first it’s simply to rearrange his position after such focus on the meal, but—the body language, he knows. it’s more obvious still with makoto’s flushed expression. dextera had gotten excited in his own way, but more aligned with an animal being given its favorite treat than the much more human response of… this. it’s not something he had fully known about makoto, though it doesn’t make him regret the meeting.
for lack of anything better, the wide gap in his knowledge of how to relate to other people showing its hand now, dextera summons up what he would like someone to show him at a vulnerable moment.
( there would be absolutely nothing in this moment worse than to come this far and find himself rejected, faced with a dawning revulsion. even some of the most pure-hearted among the Pleroma might be able to force themselves to accept a soul that had to do this, to consume the flesh and organs of other living people in order to sustain themselves, even if they might do so with great trepidation and ambivalence. but for someone like makoto, to whom such an act was something he took on purely out of personal interest and pleasure... no, there are likely few enough souls among the Kenoma that would accept this knowledge without allowing it to color their perception of him. that's why he doesn't share this side of him with anyone save J, the demon that had been subjected to the best and the worst of him, who had satisfied his violent and morbid desires at his own detriment — he didn't want to face the same judgment, horror, and disgust that he had experienced when he was still human.
and if he faced the same from dextera... he doesn't know what it would do to him. he figures it would be just like anything else in his life: him having dug through the dirt and grime to find the barest shining hope for something, only to have it tarnish and turn to ash in his hands.
so in these first few moments of choking, stagnant silence after he curls up in on himself, he is terrified. he knows he can't expect words from dextera, and he doesn't sense the other young man move beside him, so — he doesn't know what to expect. he doesn't know what he might see. and so for a sizable pause he doesn't look up, prepared to live on the cusp of that Schrödinger's moment. but he can't do so forever, and as the anxiety of it all threatens to overtake him completely, he forces himself to look up and over to where dextera sat a short distance away.
...smiling. not necessarily guilelessly — he doesn't get the sense that the man is blissfully ignorant, but... at least in a way that seems accepting.
the only thing makoto will come to appreciate about his own conduct in this moment is that he doesn't cry. that would have been so devastatingly embarrassing that he might never have recovered. but he does feel an overwhelming wave of emotion clutch at his throat like throttling hands, and his lips press into a thin, white line as he keeps it all down for a moment before he musters some semblance of control over himself. he lets out a single laugh, an irrational and anxious bark that's half-swallowed up as he rests his forehead back on his arm once more. ) You... ( he mumbles, then pauses. ah, what does he even say to him? )
Have you ever been told that you are entirely too generous?
...Just give me a moment.
( he takes a deep breath, holds it, and breathes out; he does so as silently as he can, but the movement of his shoulders gives it away. with this and some additional time, the worst of his sudden spur of arousal fades — though it does so unhappily, leaving him somewhat discontented, but not enough that it mars this moment that they share. he slowly uncurls from the defensive position he'd contorted in, and he releases a long breath, some of the tension starting to ease out of his shoulders. ) I'm sorry. I - ... It's been years, since I've done something like this last. ( not that his self-control has ever been so good, but... )
Edited (i had a better icon) 2022-09-01 08:48 (UTC)
[ dextera has been in this situation at much worse times, and sure, that may have been brought about by unnatural lust rather than his own interest, but the fact remains that he’s shown a side to himself to others that he would have preferred to keep secret from most. he’s not going to judge makoto for having a body that can still respond to stimuli… even if the stimuli isn’t what most people would call normal.
he gives makoto the moment he needs, cleaning up what he can though they’ve made pretty good work of it all, and when makoto finally relents to apologize, dextera is a little surprised. ]
…?
[ the question is obvious for the point at which dextera’s expression changes from that reassuring smile to curiosity—years, really? he knows makoto isn’t really human, evidenced by all of him, but he still looks fairly young. years doesn’t seem like the right timeframe for either incident; not what they just shared, nor what makoto’s body just put him through. ]
( dextera's overall lack of judgment in the moment is appreciated — he realizes in this moment that in the last few years, all moments in which arousal might have been a factor were typically incited or controlled by the demons he's been surrounded by, either within or just outside of his own control. but the context had been different, and so of course it would have been an element and a factor; dextera had invited him here for seemingly completely different reasons, so... to makoto, he feels as though he offers clemency in the form of unquestioning understanding, and he appreciates that. even though it still embarrasses him to all ends, even as it had a few years ago whenever J had managed to get some perverse thrill out of him that he hadn't expected. that does just seem to be his par for the course.
makoto is quiet as he watches dextera clean up what little remains, a faint yet sheepish smile just barely visible on his features. for some reason, even in the afterglow of what they had done to the remains of a man dextera had killed, the evidence of it still scattered around them... he looks younger now than he usually does, perhaps simply because he lets down several of the barrier layers he typically mirrors around himself.
is it so strange that it's been so long? he likely could have indulged — J made it apparent that all he had to do was ask and be sure to seem worthy in the moment — but he had purposefully denied himself. he had kept himself hungry (metaphorically, but also literally) in order to keep himself sharp, the desperation of want driving him past his normal limits. but less of that mattered now. he had never thought he could share something like this with another, and so before he really can consciously track what he's doing, he finds that he's in motion; he shifts soundlessly to a place alongside dextera, one hand pressed into the soft earth as balance as the other finds the other young man's jawline to carefully (and seemingly with much practice) guide his face towards his own. it all happens very quickly, in a way that is so casual and understated that it might be made all the more shocking for it, and it's remarkably chaste — makoto's lips, still faintly tacky with half-dried blood, form to the shape of dextera's own just long enough for the warm of flesh and breath to register, and then he separates from him. he is still close by, though his hand drops; his eyes are half-lidded as he observes him, and he explains the gesture in one simple phrase that fans out in gentle breath, )
Thank you.
( even before he had worked in datenshou's brothel, he had both traded and been traded affection as chit for what was either owed or granted due to a feeling of deserving. in the present moment, he doesn't think it's so odd, because of that, though... there's something sharply human that begins to fight its way into the look in his eyes, a reprise of sudden concern that this might yet be a step too far, especially considering the circumstances and how affected he had been a moment before — )
makoto, in directing dextera’s head, meets only the most cursory resistance. it’s more instinctive than conscious, and as soon as dextera realizes the touch is gentle and not at all meant to harm, he faces makoto properly and is rewarded for his compliance.
dextera doesn’t taste the blood with the shallowness of the kiss, but he feels it; a visceral, grounding thing amidst the way surprise seems to briefly separate his mind and his body. their circumstances neatly coalesce down to the warm point of contact between their lips, and dextera’s senses have to return one by one as if filing in after makoto expresses his gratitude. ]
…
[ he doesn’t know what he’s expected to do in this situation. nobody would. no one else in the world has done this, and that faint realization brings with it some relief—there’s technically nothing he can do that’s wrong, if no one has ever dictated what would be right.
even as he tries in the face of makoto’s concern to offer an instant, perfect answer, his body moves before him as it always does.
dextera’s hands lift to frame makoto’s face. his thumbs sit at either corner of makoto’s mouth—his thumbs, too, still have blood on skin and in the ridges of his nails. once he’s actually touching makoto, his hands are grave-still and he seems caught between two places, his body’s desire and his mind’s rationale leaving him somewhat bereft of a next step. his wide gaze into makoto’s is likely the most sustained eye contact he’s had with another person in—
ages. ever. he doesn’t know what he wants to say. maybe, he just wants to look at makoto until understanding comes to him, a necessary reassurance that makoto has nothing to worry about.
he doesn’t even breathe, holding onto makoto’s sigh in his lungs. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
communion, the last day of the soviseri event
once he’s back in godsblood, safe away from anyone who might have seen him in venera, he withdraws his shard.
the message he sends makoto is a bit unlike his usual—he’s still skittish, afraid of being caught. rather than words, dextera conveys a series of impressions and emotions. it’s all in images like a montage: the guard he chose, the murder itself. dextera’s heavy breaths and his own hands carefully extracting all he can find in tact. he particularly lingers on the heart, savoring the way it continues to beat for some moments longer than the person himself has lived. in dextera’s memory, shown to makoto through this, the color is a bright and unnatural red.
he’s careful about the way he sets it aside in his mind, and with all those thoughts given, dextera knows makoto will understand. ]
I have something for you. When you have time…
[ as if there wasn’t a battle between their factions. ]
cw gore, vore mention
so it's late on the 25th of soviseri when he wakes up and sees that dextera has contacted him. that realization comes with a twined feeling of anticipation and worry. had something happened to him, or was he just checking in on him?
what he witnesses when he accesses the message is quite outside what he had expected. his rapt and wide-eyed fascination sharpen into something intent and craving at the images of actual violence, portrayed through Communion with the phantom voyeurism of the perspective from dextera's eyes, tinged on all sides by the presence of his feelings, of his own personal fixation. besides the shriveled animal one that dextera had given him all those months ago, makoto has never eaten a heart — when contracted to J, he had ripped him in half and started with the lower one, and from there he had never gotten so far as his entrails — but he does understand the appeal. it's been a thought that's crowded into his mind dozens of times. tearing past the flesh and cracking open the ribcage to expose what lie within, holding the demon's still-beating heart in his own hand so he could feel that he owned it and controlled it both literally and figuratively. so his attention lingers on that still-beating heart just the same as dextera's does; when the images fade and words replace them, makoto's formerly still waters have been thoroughly agitated, stirring up so much sediment that had settled to the bottom that they were now opaque and turbulent.
there are logical qualms. he's still very much on the mend from the injuries he received, and they're still standing in the threshold of conflict between their two spiritual sects.
but how the hell is he supposed to say no to all of this?
his first response is actually a laugh, a sound as breathless and wry as his response. ) And here I've been thinking on how I might repay you for what you brought me in the caverns... You beat me to it.
( in his quarters, still holding his shard, he sits up in bed. some of the pain might filter through their connection — deep lacerations encircle his torso like an embrace, even if they are neatly sewn shut — but it doesn't stop him from moving. )
For such an offer, how could I not make time?
not me forgetting the cw
and when he does partake of this morbid feast he’s collected for himself and makoto both, he’ll be perfectly normal again. the proximity to life will restore him in ways no magic spell could, and even if it isn’t the same for makoto, dextera understands there’s value in it nonetheless. ]
…
[ dextera still begins to inquire whether or not makoto is okay, but he stops himself with the acknowledgment that he’ll find out soon enough what makoto’s physical condition is like. ]
I don’t want anyone else to see.
[ in other words, they need to choose their meeting place carefully—a given, perhaps, but also an indication that dextera feels some shame and anxiety over the gesture despite committing to it enough to arrive here. ]
anything in this inbox runs the risk of those cws
he will be able to teleport, he will be able to move, but... dextera's concerns might pose a somewhat thorny issue. )
I don't believe I'm in any state to fly, Dextera.
( not without running the risk of opening up all of his wounds while in midair, perforating like a plastic bag... )
If you have any thoughts on where we might meet, it would need to be close to one of the shrines.
no subject
he’s silent for a moment, weighing his own fears against makoto’s health. there’s no point in offering a gift that he might have to withdraw just because he’s afraid. he knows for a fact there were various portals set up to span the continent during the events of the past two weeks, but he’s not so unwise as to reveal the pleroma’s side of things to makoto. simply inviting him to find his own way to godsblood, however, can’t be all that much of a problem.
it’s stupid, though, and so he hedges his bets. ]
Is the Lover Shrine too hard? To get back from?
[ he doesn’t wait for makoto’s answer. ]
I know some of you didn’t use a ship to get to Godsblood… if there’s a way for you to come here… I can…
[ he falters, but at least communion carries the rest of his implication through; dextera will not expect makoto to walk right back into the heart of godsblood, but his months spent in the city means he knows a few secluded spots outside of it, unguarded, that dextera can hide them away in. ]
no subject
( he has his returning stone from several months ago, when it had been given to him to help facilitate in bringing new Aion recruits to achamoth. it has charge. so long as he is alone and undisturbed to use it, secure in similar concerns that he's not inadvertently being a security risk to his sect, it shouldn't be an issue returning to the cold, echoing caverns beneath the citadel.
he can understand the trepidation of simply going back to the lover's shrine. it had served its purpose for their first meeting, but others could teleport there just as easily as they could, and if there were any Aions that were dissipated in these last few days, they would potentially need to be taken back there to recover. makoto is similarly unenthused by the idea of being found, both because he doesn't exactly try to make his highly unusual and taboo proclivities publicly known, but also because he's not in a state to defend himself against a sudden attack.
mention of godsblood prompts a defensive prickle from makoto. still, he gleans the meaning from dextera's request — he doesn't expect him to walk into the lion's den, a place that makoto currently has no idea as to the present state. had the execution been carried out? he would have to hear from someone else. regardless, just as wary as he is of a location with moderately high Pleroma presence, he's just as wary of tipping his hand as to where the portal that eustace had set up was located. even if dextera might not use that information, someone else might — he can't be convinced the Regent is the only creature with the power to pluck out memories of use and interest.
because this is dextera, and because he offers such a fine gift, he compromises: ) Show me where we might meet, and I will tell you if I can make it there. ( it's not as perfect or clever as he would have wanted, but at least it makes it vague enough as to where the portal might be, either within or outside of godsblood proper. )
no subject
…I took a bath.
[ dextera remembers to relay this information before he distracts himself trying to conduct a mental map of their meeting place.
the place he chooses is a small wooded area on the outskirts of godsblood. it’s not good for lumber compared to the dense forest next to the syraku shipyard, and godsblood itself is much more thoroughly equipped for fishing than anything the small bay could offer. with the knowledge comes dextera’s mild but sincere conviction that they won’t be discovered. ]
no subject
in the receptive openness as he waits for a location, he can't help an obvious lilt of amusement that escapes him at the interjected comment. one colored with abject fondness, and he mostly keeps the faint condescension out of it. )
You remembered. I'm glad.
( though, honestly, given the "gifts" that dextera is bringing, makoto might have made a singular exception in this case.
the location is outside of the city, just as the portal that eustace placed is. it's not that it's close, but it's not egregiously far either. he's certain he could make the walk, but he will likely have to walk an additional distance so he can appear to arrive from a different direction than the one pointing directly to the portal (just in case).
still. it's doable. ) It will take some time, but I should be able to make it there. Perhaps - in two or three hours' time?
communion → action
[ dextera can maintain the freshness of the meat for a little longer still. they won’t be sticky-hot and steaming from the body anymore, and they haven’t been a couple days now, but they would be more than enough to satisfy dextera on a descent to the bottom floor. it sickens him when he thinks too long about it, how comfortable he’s gotten—how necessary it’s become—with this disgusting aspect of himself, but his body craves it to the point of aching after the way he’s strained himself the past week.
those thoughts do filter through, whether he intends it or not; it’s like catching the background noise of a phone call someone forgot to hang up on. then their connection ends, as dextera places his shard back in its rightful spot.
it doesn’t take him as long as it will take makoto, and as such, he’s comfortably settled in the designated spot by the time that makoto does arrive. true to form, there’s no sense of taste and he didn’t bring anything but the bag he initially smuggled the offal out of venera with. back to a tree, he cradles it like a child, pulsing his purification into it to keep it as fresh and true to itself as he possibly can. ]
…
no subject
so, no. he keeps his attention focused on his ultimate goal. he tries. though it's no guarantee that he hasn't cheated on this, up until this point.
and he is obviously eager to do so again.
so the sensation of craving that dextera passes along is one that makoto understands, but the one that comes along with it, that feeling of shame and disgust... it's fortunate enough that it's all vague, but he still gets the sense where those feelings originate from. that, to him, is irritating. it reminds him of when he was human, warped with self-loathing and so much it often interfered with the contract he had signed — a sort of distracting noise to keep him from indulging in a single heart's desire he wanted fulfilled before the stain of his existence was wiped clean from the world.
for now, he doesn't say anything about it; he simply allows the connection to terminate. but perhaps he will, one day.
it is indeed several hours later when makoto approaches the spot that dextera had indicated. he comes from a direction roughly seventy degrees west of where the portal was situated, just in case, and he moves slowly, carefully, and stiffly, especially when it comes to any bend to his torso.
he pauses when he sees dextera, and his attention sharpens to an electric point as he notices the pulses of energy he sends through the bag. his hackles raise. he recognizes that energy, and it's not a pleasant memory. )
What are you doing to it? ( he can't help the thread of accusation that weaves through the words. he doesn't have the context for how long ago that murder was, and he hadn't gone so far as to consider how dextera might have kept the organs from spoiling. )
no subject
he stops when makoto calls out to him, though to his credit, it’s not with any guilty haste. he’s just distracted by the question, and he doesn’t want makoto to worry. ]
…
[ there’s a long moment where he tries to figure out a good way to pantomime rot, only to come up short of all possibilities. the more obscure the concept, the more difficult it is to convey.
he sets the bag aside and raises his palm, spelling out a word for makoto’s benefit rather than getting out his shard just yet. ]
Fresh.
no subject
well... yes, he supposes based on the information that dextera had shown him, he didn't have any idea when that had all taken place. if he could use that ability of his to keep the organs from spoiling, he supposes... that's fine. he has earned enough trust to take such an answer at face value. )
...Alright. If you say so.
( his raised hackles slowly lower, and he approaches, pausing a few paces away. there's an animated aura about him, both agitated and excited, nervous and raw. he's developed a sort of codified procedure with J about this sort of thing — it's been a few years, after all, but typically any flesh the demon gave up to makoto was a reward for something he'd done for him or some challenge he had successfully perceived and managed to overcome. but what they had was something altogether different... it manages to peel past all the layers of self-assuredness that makoto had enshrouded himself in when creating this demonic persona of his, piercing down to a more apprehensive, uncertain core that has existed since he was still human.
what... does he even do or say in a scenario like this? he's eager — perhaps too much, so much that he feels like it might rattle its way out of his rib cage — but he forces himself to stand with dextera, somewhat tense, searching for whatever the fuck someone would say at such a time... )
Why... ( he couldn't help be curious, but he can't seem to find the right way to phrase the question, ) Did you just want...?
( it's not as though they've discussed it, let alone at length or in detail. he's felt at the general nature of their kinship, but he doesn't know... what it is to dextera, what it means to him? what kind of world does he come from, and what relationship if any did it have to it? he doesn't need all the answers, especially if dextera is unwilling to give them, but he can't stop from being morbidly curious. )
no subject
[ dextera doesn’t usually see makoto like this. he’s learned a few different aspects by now, so the unusual side doesn’t surprise him, but he does note that makoto is capable of a face that is neither twisted in anger or flashing some cold superiority. the edges are softened in what seems to be genuine curiosity.
hesitant to make makoto take out his shard just yet, a request he has for a time after they’ve both satisfied themselves, dextera continues speaking only in the words he can find a way to communicate. he brought his notebook along just in case, but with makoto, it feels more important to him to answer from more than just a list of phrases he’s pre-written. there’s a personal connection in telling makoto letter-by-letter. ]
Hungry.
[ in that small, unassuming word, there are layers. obviously the hunger is of a different kind than dextera might feel daily; he satisfies himself from one meal to the next with normal food, even leaning toward vegetation over the array of meat available from hunting and fishing, but there’s only so long he can last before his body needs this.
conflicted by his own nature, the look in his eyes is fleetingly guilty when he answers like that. it only smooths out when he turns it back on makoto, picking up a thread from one of their earliest meetings. this rare thing they have in common. ]
You, too?
no subject
In a way...
( but it doesn't sound all that convincing when he says it.
to makoto, though... there's nuance to it. to him, there has never been a sort of survival component to this. whether he was on earth or in hell, his needs were met regardless. he could draw a relatively simple distinction between the baseline desires "to eat" and "to fuck" and feel that they were two entirely different things, but this... this fetish of his was the gray area in the middle, tearing away elements of both and piecing them together into something very nearly impossible to explain. in a way, yes, it is a sort of hunger — just as one might hunger for one's attention, for their touch, for the taste of their mouth, he felt the same, it just... progressed further. it mutated, it grew teeth and nails, it took on elements of control and possession; to hurt or to maim or to kill has never really been the driving force of his fixation, but he couldn't deny that seeing the pain that it caused only heightened his excitement. he thinks back to the month he spent contracted with J, and he can't really recall ever going to the man as if expecting a meal (not in any way besides colloquially or coquettishly, he supposes). it had always been to satisfy a morbid desire, to achieve a type of sexual satisfaction he couldn't find anywhere else.
in a way, this situation is altogether different. the organs, removed from the corporal context of the body they'd been taken from, cleaned and sanitized as they are now... this might even be an altogether different sort of thing than what he's used to just based on those factors alone. starting to sense that difference makes this even more difficult for him to parse, and therefore makes it next to impossible to explain, even as dextera looks on at him imploringly.
he's never had to explain this to anyone but J, and he had safely side-stepped the worst of that by simply forcing the man into a contract before he knew what he was agreeing to. the weight of dextera's attention brings about a very uncharacteristic flush to makoto's complexion. embarrassed. he can't believe he's fucking embarrassed, but he is. ) It's - more complicated than that, though. ( unspecific and not useful. )
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straddling two existences, the only thing dextera can do to maintain his corporeal body is consume. and when he’s fixated on that, his own body’s presence in the real world, it isn’t all that strange that emotional wires would get crossed in ways he can’t explain to many people. ]
…
[ he nods. his natural silence allows that simplicity without judgment.
then, he withdraws the spoils one delicate revelation at a time. the intestines, the liver, the heart—dextera hadn’t been lying about keeping them fresh, each of them still flushed and warm as if from the body, though with no twitching pulse of tissue the way they might be truly ripped from a torso.
he lays them out on the bag. ]
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regardless of those differences, however, dextera doesn't comment or question. instead he removes the contents of the bag and places them upon it, and even with the display of them so separated from the body that they had come from, he can tell that dextera really has kept them far fresher than he might have imagined — makoto can't help but think back to how J had looked when he had first torn him apart on his bedroom floor, the pale white of bone peeking through bloody viscera and entrails still pulsing with life where the flesh had been ripped away. he had been — it had been so...
without him noticing, his breathing had started to pick up, his heart beating away at a clip inside his chest. he takes a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment to regain his composure.
when he opens them again, ) I would hazard a guess as to your favorite.
( it's not just that a heart had been what dextera had brought him all those months ago in the cavern. it had been obvious enough to infer from the memories that he had sent him through Communion as well — the feverish haze of violence had seemed to tunnel vision on the heart as it throbbed in its place in the chest, in the palm of his hand. he's still... guessing out the etiquette of this sort of thing (would dextera even have something like that?). given that he had procured their little "feast," it seems rude to makoto to reach first. )
for real this time cw cannibalism
yes, the heart is his “favorite.” ]
…
[ when he had shown makoto initially, the blood of the body had kept the organ bright red, hot with life, though the time that’s passed and dextera’s cleanliness seems to have taken some of that immediate crimson away from it. for better or worse though, there’s a little trick that dextera has learned from the more human meta-beings—the aries, nicl and nicr, all once living people themselves before dextera’s selfish mistake turned them into little more than livestock—in order to keep his meat as fresh as possible. the heart is surrounded by a thin membrane; the thickest part of it was removed when dextera properly eviscerated the body, but there’s still a layer around it now, protecting it from things it has no idea are no longer a concern.
withdrawing his hand from his lip, dextera takes the heart to his mouth. his eyelids are half-lowered, his attention evidently focused in wide pupils. then, he sinks his teeth into that pale membrane and peels it away with a visceral rip. he takes tissue of the heart itself with the movement, and the disturbance brings with it a gush of blood that had been kept safely inside the sac. inevitably staining his sleeve, red runs down his arm and his nostrils flare in response to the iron scent of life. there’s a reason the heart is his favorite, no matter how long it took him to come to this conclusion.
lips now wet with the blood he’s released, dextera breathes an open-mouthed sigh across the organ… and offers it to makoto, a gift after all. ]
real cannibalism hours
so dextera nods, and he accepts this scrap of information about his friend with a sort of reverence, still not quite believing that he is here, sharing this sort of moment — he had always accepted that his indulgence in something like this would be a lonely and alienating one, regardless of how gracious and accommodating his demon master was to his needs.
makoto watches on in awed, breathless fascination as dextera reaches out to the inert yet warm heart, bringing it to his mouth so that he could sink his teeth into it just so, hooking onto the thin membrane of interstitial tissue that had once protected and separated it from the other discrete parts of the body that it shared. he tears away that layer as one might shuck the husk from an ear of corn, though by the nature of animal over plant, it does so more messily, loosing a small gout of blood that runs down the length of dextera's arm, staining his sleeve dark red. he wouldn't have been able to tear his eyes away even if he tried. the copper scent of blood fills the air, bizarre in its twisting nostalgia. makoto has to suddenly clench his jaw and grind his teeth, shifting in place where he crouches to the ground, unable to either attribute words or know how best to process the truly bizarre experience of watching someone else do such a thing.
but rather than proceed with the fruit of his spoils, dextera instead offers it out to him. makoto pauses for a moment, thoughts temporarily wiped clean, and then he reaches out to accept it mutely. his fingers slide across the surface of the organ, slick with blood still warm. he can't help his hands from shaking somewhat. even if it's different, the context and the overall meaning, it's just been so long —
he brings the heart to his lips and opens his mouth, lips drawing back from sharpened teeth and inhumanly long, curving canines. they sink far more easily into the flesh of the organ than his human ones might have, and he pauses for just a moment to savor the feeling of preserved vitality in his hands, the roundness and fullness of it even as he tears a part of it away. and then he does so, biting off the mouthful and then chewing. it's tougher than he might have imagined. the heart, a tireless muscle, was so different both in texture and taste from what he'd eaten before; the metallic taste of blood is almost overwhelming. but still, a wild and restless energy overtakes him, building up to the point where it threatens to overflow. he tries to keep it down, but his breath rattles as he fills and empties his lungs. he swallows, and it is different — not so rote and perfunctory as eating a meal to satisfy mechanical hunger, instead going deeper to seethe as a twisted and pervasive warmth in his blood, enraptured and lowly demanding of more.
he speaks with a tongue thick with affectation, ) I'd never tried the heart before.
( how would J's taste? blood smears his mouth; it runs down both his bottom lip, his chin, his scarred throat, and both of his arms in cooling rivulets. it's not that he doesn't want to take another bite, to tear into the thing until there's nothing left, but — he doesn't. instead, he reaches out to hand the rest of it back to dextera, and he continues, anticipating his resistance, ) Don't argue. I'm grateful to have tried it, but - it means more to you than it does to me.
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for dextera, the gore of it all is proximity to god. for makoto… well, he doesn’t entirely know, but he can begin to guess at something from the sight in front of him. ]
—
[ he’s so enraptured by the stark contrast of colors—white teeth and skin, black hair, the carmine splash of blood—that his breath catches upon being given back the heart. true to makoto’s anticipation, he moves to deny it, but it’s done in barely more than second. as soon as he’s given real permission, dextera is greedy in the way he takes it.
despite offering, there had been some envy in watching makoto eat something as rare and beautiful as the heart. he won’t give it again, now that he knows he doesn’t have to share. it’s in this second indulgence that he can really open up; his usually glassy eyes seem to gain life, as if every second he isn’t consuming is a slow march to an end. everyone is bound to die, it’s inevitable, but going without this pushes him along faster than most. though his aion body has kept him alive even as he’s denied himself in horos, he needs it. he needs this, tearing piece by piece until his hands are empty and he has only the blood left to lick. ]
Mm…
[ he exhales an urgent little sound, neither a complaint nor a whimper exactly but more like a reflex to desire, as he takes his own sleeve in his mouth and sucks the blood off that too. his skin is newly flushed, hot with color for the first time in months. ]
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truth be told, it would be bizarrely comforting to makoto that that's what it symbolizes to dextera. an interesting, refreshing, and altogether backwards sort of conception, or at least from makoto's perspective. but he would want to believe in something like that, as twisted as it was. when bending to these desires of his, he had always felt the furthest away from the conception of "God" that he had built when trying to picture the divinity that was damning him for what felt outside of his control. that guilt had plagued him far worse when he had been human and alive — he had held onto J's body in a feverish embrace, tearing strips of living flesh away from him, and all the while he had pressed mumbled apologies into his skin and peppered him with questions, "does it hurt too bad?" he had still had the decency to feel conflicted for finding pleasure in the pain of others. he had still thought it best to end his life when what gave him the most satisfaction could only be satisfied when someone was either dead or would die very soon.
he can sense the resistance at first, but he can also plainly see the release in his self-control as soon as makoto gives him full permission. he doesn't mind the brusqueness with which the heart is taken back from him; actually, a corner of his bloodied mouth tugs upwards in a smile as he watches him take it back with such force and fervency. whether or not he noticed dextera's plain envy, it didn't really matter; it was clear to him that this, for whatever reason unique to dextera, held special significance, and so he didn't mind at all giving it up to him. he pauses, rapt in his attention as he puts off reaching for something else to watch his companion instead. dextera's mien has always been a dull one, alternating blank and blunt, but he can see the fire and light and life in him as he tears into the heart with an intense sense of need. watching him do such a thing, especially with such stark imperative is — well. his eyes have lidded half-closed, and he exhales a long, slow breath from parted lips, even as dextera is certain to not waste even a single drop of blood.
he flushes red with color as well, and turns back to what remains. he begins to reach to the coils of intestines, but then he pauses, a bizarre and singular laugh leaping into the back of his throat. )
...In the past I'd done this with a fork and knife.
( it was bizarre, he knows, but that's how it had been. utensils, soy sauce, ponzu. J, torn asunder on his bedroom floor, entrails spilling free from where he'd torn him in two; heat, blood, pulsing through every part of him. he would fall to him in a passion that verged on desperation, filling his mouth with whatever part of him he could; he would bite, chew, and swallow, and he would feel the demon's hand running through his hair— not having sampled every part of the body, makoto couldn't necessarily say for certain he knew them to be his favorite, but it was the offal of the human body that always brought him back to his most powerful memories of the time he spent contracted with J.
he finishes reaching out to them, looping a length of the entrails around two of his fingers before drawing them up to himself. his heart is beating faster and faster; he is trying to maintain his composure as best he can, but it's more difficult to hide his breath, coming in quicker and more ragged. he pauses, reaching out with his other hand to mimic the same motion, pulling free a separate length of the guts and offering them to dextera.
as with the heart, he wants him to try with him.
with that accomplished, makoto raises the entrails to his mouth. he hesitates for just a moment, swallowing visibly, and then he opens his mouth and takes a bite. even with all of his jittery apprehension and excitement, he doesn't show the same forceful voracity that dextera had. it's been — years. he hasn't been able to do something like this in four or so years, not since he had bitten J's tongue out of his mouth. he wants to appreciate it, to enjoy it. he allows the offal to fill his mouth, soft and still warm with blood and life, and for a moment he keeps it there, pressed against his palate and the flat of his tongue. but... perhaps he's not so disciplined as he would like to believe. his breath hitches, and his teeth shear the bite away from the whole; he chews, blood and juice filling his mouth, and a small sound lifts from the back of his throat before he swallows it down and continues with far more focus and drive, the cadence of his eating sometimes slowing in moments where he seems to appreciate and savor something for a beat before continuing — until the moment that the intestines, between the two of them, have all been eaten, or he is very nearly full from his ravenous attack on them.
his blood moves through his body in what feels like a slow yet urging crawl, thick and inexorable; where before the flush of warmth and color had been like a brush across his cheeks, a faint indication of his being flustered, now it colors his face more earnestly, pooling in the hollow of his throat and burning in the tips of his ears. even with his best efforts to control it, his breathing is thick and affected; feeling embarrassed to be like this around anyone else but J, he curls inward to himself a bit, drawing his knees closer. he hadn't really thought about this part, so excited to be in the passion of the moment that he hadn't thought about what it might feel like to feel so... precariously exposed to someone he already got the feeling did not have the same exact relationship to this particular act as he does.
he is at least... trying to deal with it as much grace as he possibly can. trying to calm his breathing, slow the urging of his blood, and just... wait it out. )
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less interest in the offal means more interest in makoto himself. though dextera stuffs his mouth with the gusto of a man who skipped breakfast, fingers slipping past his own lips to keep the heft of the meat secure inside as he chews, his eyes inevitably remain on the person he’s invited here to partake. ]
…
[ remain, and remain, up to the point that there’s nothing else dextera could distract himself with anyway and he can only watch the line of makoto’s body as he shifts to protect himself. dextera assumes at first it’s simply to rearrange his position after such focus on the meal, but—the body language, he knows. it’s more obvious still with makoto’s flushed expression. dextera had gotten excited in his own way, but more aligned with an animal being given its favorite treat than the much more human response of… this. it’s not something he had fully known about makoto, though it doesn’t make him regret the meeting.
for lack of anything better, the wide gap in his knowledge of how to relate to other people showing its hand now, dextera summons up what he would like someone to show him at a vulnerable moment.
utterly bereft of judgment, he smiles. ]
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and if he faced the same from dextera... he doesn't know what it would do to him. he figures it would be just like anything else in his life: him having dug through the dirt and grime to find the barest shining hope for something, only to have it tarnish and turn to ash in his hands.
so in these first few moments of choking, stagnant silence after he curls up in on himself, he is terrified. he knows he can't expect words from dextera, and he doesn't sense the other young man move beside him, so — he doesn't know what to expect. he doesn't know what he might see. and so for a sizable pause he doesn't look up, prepared to live on the cusp of that Schrödinger's moment. but he can't do so forever, and as the anxiety of it all threatens to overtake him completely, he forces himself to look up and over to where dextera sat a short distance away.
...smiling. not necessarily guilelessly — he doesn't get the sense that the man is blissfully ignorant, but... at least in a way that seems accepting.
the only thing makoto will come to appreciate about his own conduct in this moment is that he doesn't cry. that would have been so devastatingly embarrassing that he might never have recovered. but he does feel an overwhelming wave of emotion clutch at his throat like throttling hands, and his lips press into a thin, white line as he keeps it all down for a moment before he musters some semblance of control over himself. he lets out a single laugh, an irrational and anxious bark that's half-swallowed up as he rests his forehead back on his arm once more. ) You... ( he mumbles, then pauses. ah, what does he even say to him? )
Have you ever been told that you are entirely too generous?
...Just give me a moment.
( he takes a deep breath, holds it, and breathes out; he does so as silently as he can, but the movement of his shoulders gives it away. with this and some additional time, the worst of his sudden spur of arousal fades — though it does so unhappily, leaving him somewhat discontented, but not enough that it mars this moment that they share. he slowly uncurls from the defensive position he'd contorted in, and he releases a long breath, some of the tension starting to ease out of his shoulders. ) I'm sorry. I - ... It's been years, since I've done something like this last. ( not that his self-control has ever been so good, but... )
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he gives makoto the moment he needs, cleaning up what he can though they’ve made pretty good work of it all, and when makoto finally relents to apologize, dextera is a little surprised. ]
…?
[ the question is obvious for the point at which dextera’s expression changes from that reassuring smile to curiosity—years, really? he knows makoto isn’t really human, evidenced by all of him, but he still looks fairly young. years doesn’t seem like the right timeframe for either incident; not what they just shared, nor what makoto’s body just put him through. ]
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makoto is quiet as he watches dextera clean up what little remains, a faint yet sheepish smile just barely visible on his features. for some reason, even in the afterglow of what they had done to the remains of a man dextera had killed, the evidence of it still scattered around them... he looks younger now than he usually does, perhaps simply because he lets down several of the barrier layers he typically mirrors around himself.
is it so strange that it's been so long? he likely could have indulged — J made it apparent that all he had to do was ask and be sure to seem worthy in the moment — but he had purposefully denied himself. he had kept himself hungry (metaphorically, but also literally) in order to keep himself sharp, the desperation of want driving him past his normal limits. but less of that mattered now. he had never thought he could share something like this with another, and so before he really can consciously track what he's doing, he finds that he's in motion; he shifts soundlessly to a place alongside dextera, one hand pressed into the soft earth as balance as the other finds the other young man's jawline to carefully (and seemingly with much practice) guide his face towards his own. it all happens very quickly, in a way that is so casual and understated that it might be made all the more shocking for it, and it's remarkably chaste — makoto's lips, still faintly tacky with half-dried blood, form to the shape of dextera's own just long enough for the warm of flesh and breath to register, and then he separates from him. he is still close by, though his hand drops; his eyes are half-lidded as he observes him, and he explains the gesture in one simple phrase that fans out in gentle breath, )
Thank you.
( even before he had worked in datenshou's brothel, he had both traded and been traded affection as chit for what was either owed or granted due to a feeling of deserving. in the present moment, he doesn't think it's so odd, because of that, though... there's something sharply human that begins to fight its way into the look in his eyes, a reprise of sudden concern that this might yet be a step too far, especially considering the circumstances and how affected he had been a moment before — )
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makoto, in directing dextera’s head, meets only the most cursory resistance. it’s more instinctive than conscious, and as soon as dextera realizes the touch is gentle and not at all meant to harm, he faces makoto properly and is rewarded for his compliance.
dextera doesn’t taste the blood with the shallowness of the kiss, but he feels it; a visceral, grounding thing amidst the way surprise seems to briefly separate his mind and his body. their circumstances neatly coalesce down to the warm point of contact between their lips, and dextera’s senses have to return one by one as if filing in after makoto expresses his gratitude. ]
…
[ he doesn’t know what he’s expected to do in this situation. nobody would. no one else in the world has done this, and that faint realization brings with it some relief—there’s technically nothing he can do that’s wrong, if no one has ever dictated what would be right.
even as he tries in the face of makoto’s concern to offer an instant, perfect answer, his body moves before him as it always does.
dextera’s hands lift to frame makoto’s face. his thumbs sit at either corner of makoto’s mouth—his thumbs, too, still have blood on skin and in the ridges of his nails. once he’s actually touching makoto, his hands are grave-still and he seems caught between two places, his body’s desire and his mind’s rationale leaving him somewhat bereft of a next step. his wide gaze into makoto’s is likely the most sustained eye contact he’s had with another person in—
ages. ever. he doesn’t know what he wants to say. maybe, he just wants to look at makoto until understanding comes to him, a necessary reassurance that makoto has nothing to worry about.
he doesn’t even breathe, holding onto makoto’s sigh in his lungs. ]
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