Chapter Forty-Seven — Spread Too Thin
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This chapter is slightly longer than usual to make up for a slightly shorter previous chapter ^^. It deals with the hanging plots after the battle, so there are several breaks in the chapter to manage the flow because so much stuff happens. Hope you enjoy it more than poor Nekohiko does!

 

Chapter Forty-Seven

Spread Too Thin

 

The two pairs of siblings went separate ways at the doors of Aomi's and Kataji's prison quarters. The doors hadn't been guarded, which caused Kasuga to dart inside and check if Kataji was even alive. But he was. Nekohiko saw only a glimpse of him from high atop Kasuga's epaulet, yet Kataji seemed very much fine inside the room Kasuga unsealed with her Binding.

Did she find it strange that Kataji was all alone in a sealed room? Hard to tell. She kept her expression aloof, though Nekohiko still saw her nostrils flaring for a heartbeat.

An entire convoy of Nagare soldiers was standing guard in the hallway and all the adjacent corridors so as not to miss anything the Supreme Divine Majesty might be doing to trick their Queen's hospitality. When Kasuga exited the rooms and came face to face with Abihiko and Aomi who were waiting outside, she didn't deem it necessary to tell them in which state he had found Kataji.

Perhaps, she did not care much. Alive meant alive. Her Kingdom had far greater troubles at the moment.

Concerned solely with the well-being of her people, Kasuga suggested to Abihiko they cast the Bound contract of non-action for a day. A pretty neat suggestion as Nekohiko saw it. He would have suggested it too. Ah, Kasuga. Lord Kazuragi had been right about her, after all. She and Nekohiko would absolutely get along together.

And Abihiko not only agreed to the spell. The moment he and Kasuga had shaken hands and secured each other's intent and the promise of non-action in the Spiritside, he also reached for his sword. And gave it up to Kasuga.

She frowned at it as though it would bite her.

"Token of my friendliness," Abihiko said. "You can give me yours."

The girl clutched Netsuito to her chest tighter.

"Not the weapon. Anything else of value," Abihiko sighed.

"Oh."

For a few breaths, Kasuga was still frowning as she went through her thoughts. "I have nothing of value," she said at last. "Only my honor and my country. My people's dignity. I cannot give anyone that, even as a token."

"Tchhh," Aomi said, her eyes rolling well into her head. "What a bore."

His lips pursed, Abihiko half-hugged Aomi to himself. "Please be quiet for once," he whispered.

Indeed, Kasuga's deadly stare at Aomi promised nothing good. The Nagare Queen took Maple Apple in her hand, gave Abihiko one curt nod, then departed surrounded by a circle of her bodyguards.

"The Supreme Divine Majesty's personal chambers will be prepared in due order," she said instead of goodbye.

Nekohiko had already crawled off Kasuga's shoulder to Mikawa's, and from Mikawa -- to Aomi when the two stood next to each other, subtly leaning to murmur into one another's ears. Stuff like "I told you it was a bad idea!" and "Relax, stop being such a baby" with many variations.

Of course Kasuga and Mikawa were a fascinating area of study and spying if he thought about it. Being a ladybug, he could have stayed on them for as long as he wished.

The problem was -- he was now stretched thin between Kataji who had the absolute bulk of his bodies counting in hundreds of pieces, between Abihiko's seashell, between the cat which was broken but still usable.  At least the snake had been obliterated into mulch! Already a breather. But even with such a low number of places his consciousness could be -- and a low number of people his attention could snap to -- it took its toll.

Keeping only around the Abi family was best for now. His attention cost a lot. He wasn't like a magpie or a goldfish, to be able to be distracted so easily by many things at once.

Unlike some very specific people.

Aomi and Abihiko already began subtly harassing each other. Aomi poked Abihiko's side, trying to gauge a reaction out of him. And Abihiko, in front of so many Nagare soldiers with their stone-expression faces, had to force his kingly poise and not give in to Aomi's teasing.

He grabbed her in his arms -- which looked very similar to a headlock he was so good at -- and restrained all her attempts to humiliate His own Majesty before his subjects.

"Mikawa," Kasuga called coolly.

From over Aomi's stiff collar where Nekohiko's ladybug had settled, Mikawa's face looked especially pitiful. The boy threw desperate glances at Kasuga's departing figure, then at Abihiko's and Aomi's sibling embrace. Misery and envy showed very distinctly in his eyes.

"Bye," he forced out and gave Abihiko and Aomi a timid wave of his hand.

"Bye-bye! Don't forget your promise to take me pigeon-racing!" Aomi yelled after, spooking Mikawa and giving Kasuga another opportunity to clench her fists in stifled anger.

"And now!" Aomi wriggled out of Abihiko's arms and jumped onto his back. He swayed in surprise but didn't bend. Aomi whistled appreciatively. "Mikawa plopped onto his face the first time I jumped onto his back like this! Kataji starts yelling at me and running away like a little girl. Aww, I missed you and your comfy back so much, Eldest Brother!"

"Aomi," Abihiko told her patiently. "We're not alone. Can you wait until there are no people around us before you demean the Emperor like this? I'm not your pony. Neither is Kataji nor Mikawa."

"You mean them?" Aomi stuck her thumb at the dozens of Nagare soldiers at the doors. "Pfff, yeah right. They're not real people."

"Excuse me?" Abihiko coughed. Nonetheless, he wanted to get out of the grim, sour stares of Nagare guards even more so he sidled through the doors as swiftly as possible.

"Well, all legends and storytales have background characters like that, yes?" Aomi wondered out-loud, still clinging to Abihiko's back even after he slammed the doors closed, leaving all the glowering Nagares behind. "I mean, have you ever seen a fictional guard or a random peasant or a disciple in a martial arts school do anything more than 'ooooh' and 'ahhhhh' on the sides while the main characters do their thing?"

"Don't tell me you believe you are the main character of a story," Abihiko said, only slightly annoyed. "Get off me."

"Well. Duh. Who else deserves to be the main character?" Aomi did get off his back, only to pout about being pushed away and ignored now.

Because once alone and without witnesses, Abihiko didn't hide how weary and tense he was. He cracked his joints, spreading his arms and rolling his neck as though after a very arduous task. Which, Nekohiko suspected, it had been. How fast had Abihiko and his guards ridden to get from Nara to here in such a short time? They must not have slept or rested much to be able to do that.

But even this wasn't the end of his duties. Abihiko already turned, checking the spacious quarters for signs of life.

"Where is Kataji?"

"What a curious question," Kataji's voice rang from his room, cold and dour. The room's door was open only a crack, and through it, bright electric light poured in a thin sliver to the glass floor. "Did you hear that? Someone other than you is interested in me. You might have just gotten competition!"

Abihiko and Aomi exchanged concerned glances.

Abihiko's lips moved. "He has someone with him?"

"No...?" Aomi mouthed back, perplexed. "He's Kataji. He has nobody." Then her gaze fell onto Nekohiko's ladybug on her collar. "Unless it's you?" she murmured at Nekohiko.

But Nekohiko could only shake his antennae in negation. He was not with Kataji now. And hadn't been ever since this battle had begun.

Well...

He'd been there only a moment to check if Kataji was alive and well, but then he'd had to leave. Later, he had felt that Kataji talked and begged and asked him what was going on during the battle, but... really, Nekohiko hadn't had time to respond.

Now, he felt he should have.

Abihiko knocked on Kataji's door.

"Come on in! Let's take a good look at who's so bored with the other events in his life that he has time to spend on me!"

A slight irritation passed through Abihiko's features as he pushed the door open.

Aomi ran in after Abihiko and bumped into him head-on. Because when Abihiko had walked in, he froze on the spot, too shocked to react to what waited for him inside.

Like the rest of the castle, the room was still a mess after all the gravitational tumbling. But in the stark center of it, Kataji had tidied it up a little and had even begun his usual drafting and woodwork.

He turned to them, smiling widely, which was the harshest thing about him. From having spent so much time indoors, Kataji looked wan. Bruises from the Nagare beating and the castle tilting peppered his pale face. His hair was in disarray, giving him quite a mad look. He had no wheelchair in this room, but he still sat crookedly due to his recovering legs, which only highlighted his gaunt, unhealthy appearance.

On the side of the desk at which Kataji was working on the graphs of the bisected human skull, sat a humanoid figure.

With horror, Nekohiko realized it was... himself.

His body. Or at least his future body.

It wasn't complete yet. It had many parts still barely shaped and strung together. But the overall silhouette was very recognizable when the head, the chest, two arms down to the elbow, and two legs assembled from shapeless logs were tied together with strings.

When had Kataji time to do that?

How many hours had passed during or after the battle? It was evening outside... Had Kataji been trapped in this room for the entire day while he'd had no chance to know what was going on outside?

The future dummy looked limp and droopy, sitting on the floor opposite Kataji. Its head already possessed an overall hint of features -- nose, eyeholes, the upper part of the jaw and the lower one, hanging off the connecting joints.

"This thing is creepy as hell," Aomi said, gaping.

"It's not finished. I was merely assembling it to see if parts fit together. Since I had nothing better to do today," Kataji explained, but then smiled even wider at her and Abihiko. A smudge of blood popped bright against one of his teeth. "Then I realized that it's nice, to have someone around you can talk to. So I didn't disassemble it afterward."

"Kataji, you're bruised all over. Let me take care of it." Abihiko wanted to take a step forward, but Kataji waved him off.

"Aren't we all? Look at yourselves -- you are both wounded as well. Wars, am I right?" Kataji chuckled.

"When did you get hurt? Did someone do this to you--?" Aomi asked next, glancing around with hidden worry.

"No, no, no! Nobody did. Just the castle tumbling. I flew up along with all the furniture and other background elements. Come on, who would ever care enough about me to come and harm me, mmm?" He turned toward Nekohiko's half-assembled dummy for the last question, and Nekohiko felt his stomach plummeting.

He should not have abandoned Kataji for so long after Kataji's life had been threatened.

The young man must have spent the whole day waiting for someone else to come and finish their job mutilating him or murdering him while the only person he could communicate with, ignored him.

It must not have been a nice day.

Or a nice week. Or a nice month ever since Nekohiko had begun spending all his time with anyone else but him.

"You are talking to a dummy?" Abihiko asked, something like pity creeping into his tone. "Kataji..."

"What? No. I would not be talking to a dummy, thank you very much for asking." Kataji gave Abihiko a displeased up-and-down. "I was merely pretending, don't you worry. Only an idiot would expect a wooden doll to answer. But since everyone else is always gone, I have to entertain myself somehow." His smile disappeared as quickly as it came. "What's so hard to understand?"

Oh, Kataji...

"Oh. All right. But really, I didn't know you made human dolls, too." Abihiko walked to Kataji who gathered his long legs to his chest and out of Abihiko's way. Abihiko had nothing better to do but sit on Kataji's overturned bed, watching him with a sort of worried affection. "It's... pretty."

"Wow, flattery," Kataji scoffed. "The thing is ugly. It's meant to have fat and tissue and skin Bound on top of the wood, so it's not much different from a skeleton now, come on."

"Still, Kata." Abihiko leaned forward, teeth opening in a cheeky grin. "You're so talented, so cute, so... Ah, I missed you and your prickly manner so much! Come here, you little hedgehog!"

"Hmph."

Kataji gave him a stink eye and wanted to turn away, but Abihiko lunged for him and caught him into a...

No, not a hug. Abihiko's go-to method of expressing his fancy was still the same old headlock.

"Kataji, I missed you so much!" He squeezed and hugged him to himself against all attempts to resist. "I haven't seen you in ages! Stand up, I want to see how tall you are now!"

"Get off me! This is unacceptable! I am disabled!"

"Nonsense! I'll heal your legs in no time!"

"Yay!" Aomi squealed, jumping into the brother tangle and hugging writhing Kataji who didn't seem disabled at all as he tried to kick and run away. She caught him on the other side from Abihiko's, and the two of them finally secured Kataji in their center. "I missed you too, Kataji!"

"You've seen me a few hours ago!"

"I still missed you so much!" And she smooched him in his cheek. And since Abihiko had never been one to shy away from aggravating displays of affection, he smooched Kataji in his other cheek as well.

Kataji could only grit his teeth and endure it all. But he was no longer sulking. Instead, a mist of tears appeared in his eyes as he let Abihiko and Aomi hug him from both sides.

...

How... how did these two do this?

Just a minute ago, Kataji had been so depressed, so moody, and sullen. And now he was grumbling at them but accepting their annoying behaviors all the same...

How? So easily, Aomi and Anihiko could turn someone completely around and lift his mood in a minute. Was this what all siblings did? Nekohiko could have never achieved that. If not for them, he would have felt completely inadequate in dealing with Kataji's shock and trauma after today.

But these two had simply pushed through it.

Before, he had never felt jealous of other people's social skills, but now he did. If anything, this sappy family reunion even made him... ache.

He had no family, after all. No friends. Only makers, masters, allies, and enemies.

Ultimately, he had only himself. But at least in several forms, eh?

Where was his cat form? Perhaps it was time for him to get it back... Not like being here as the ladybug would do anything for him other than twist his heart into useless knots.

A ceremonious knock came at the doors. A Nagare servant coming to inform His Supreme Divine Majesty that his own private chambers were waiting for him. As was the convoy that would take him there.

Abihiko had only had a spare moment to himself as he lay on Kataji's bed after all the kicking and elbowing each other for a while. He was only lying and staring at the ceiling... just, resting.

But of course it was time to go.

 


***

 

"Wait, wait, wait!" Aomi cried, running after him to the doors and the Nagare people waiting on the other side. "Almost forgot there was someone else you were supposed to meet!" She caught the lapels of Abihiko's beautiful dark-red robes and tugged at them appreciatively. "I love it when you wear red! So happy he'll see you like this, and not when you wear that stupid green Imperial dress all the time. Green saps all color out of you. You should always wear red, all right?"

"Aomi." Abihiko held her wrists. "I have to go--"

"The moment I met him, I promised him that this day will come. I'll introduce you two to each other! It's such luck that you're at your most attractive today! So here goes, Eldest Brother..."

Wh-- n-no. No!

Nekohiko hated the direction this was taking! He could already predict--

With a magnificent flourish, Aomi tore his ladybug body off her collar and put him on her palm. Then she stuck him into Abihiko's face.

"This is Itsuki! Cousin Itsuki Kasuga had been telling you about, that annoying gossip-mouth. And Cousin Itsuki is very pleased to meet you, Eldest Brother!"

With the same concerned expression that Abihiko had previously given Kataji and his doll, Abihiko took his eyes off his sister and fixed them on Nekohiko's teeny, tiny, meager body.

Nekohiko froze, appalled and mortified.

And stared back at him.

Abihiko blinked. "What am I looking at?"

"This." Aomi pointed.

"A bug? It's very pretty, Aomi."

"Not a bug! It's a ladybug doll," she corrected him.

"I guess I'm happy to find out that you and Kasuga bond over playing with dolls. And yet, when she mentioned it, she sounded as though this... Cousin Itsuki was something much more significant than a mere doll of a bug."

Aomi nodded with a very profound expression on her face. "Ah, she's a bit... not right in the head, you know."

"Oh really."

Aomi raised her shoulders defensively. "Just humor her next time she talks to you about Cousin Itsu, all right? No need to give her more headache with that while this horrible war is going on, is there?"

"Mmmm." However, Abihiko was clearly not in the mood for more games with Aomi, so he caved in. "Well, you are giving me a headache right now, too, so... As you say."

He wanted to turn, but Aomi stomped her feet.

"Can't you show a little bit more excitement, please? This ladybug had waited to see you for so long! I promised him to make this happen, and all you can say is that 'it's pretty'? Give him your smile. Make a joke. I don't know -- show him your abs. Make him fall in love with you like all people."

...

Nekohiko's soul was in pain. In second-hand embarrassment, too. He didn't know if it was more horrible to be himself or to be Abihiko while all those Nagare soldiers behind the doorway were listening to this maddening conversation. He had to give it to them -- their faces were just as stony as always.

Abihiko's hand slowly crept to the bridge of his nose to pinch it. "I... don't know what to say, Aomi. It's... a 'he'?"

She smiled proudly. "Can you do this one thing for me? Carry him on your lapel like this. I assume you didn't get the amazing seashell pendant I sent you--"

Abihiko cocked his chin. "I did."

"Yes, but I don't see it anywhere on you like I wanted it to be!" she drawled, sulky. "So if you don't like it and don't want to carry it, at least carry my poor ladybug Cousin Itsuki. I want him to know you the way I know you." She showed teeth and the tip of her red tongue. "For the great person that you are."

Without another word, Abihiko slowly pried open the high, stiff collar of his robes. For the first time in days, the seashell Nekohiko saw the light of day and Aomi's confounded face peeking in at him.

"I wear it," Abihiko said. "At first, I wasn't a fan of the shape you've given it, but... it is a nice gift. Of course I carry it."

Nekohiko quickly averted his eyes from Aomi's hardening gaze.

She wasn't happy, huh? That he'd told her the seashell was kept hell knew where? She didn't like being lied to? Oh no, poor her.

But the girl assumed her typical cheery mien almost immediately. She put the ladybug back onto her shoulder, then reached out to Abihiko's collar and snapped it wider and wider until it wasn't covering the seashell at all.

"If you like it, then show it!" she said. "Don't cover it! You're suffocating it, you're disrespecting my gifts!"

"Sure." He sighed, but no tiredness or sadness marred his voice. He sounded happy. Content. Peaceful. "Give me the ladybug, too, if you're so inclined--"

"Na-ah-ah! You're good with just one of my gifts." She slapped his shoulder with her hand, then hopped backward as though to avoid him. "Why would I give you more if you already wear one? Shoo, shoo. Go. Weren't you supposed to check out your private chambers or something?"

Abihiko took several steps down the hall in the circle of his escorting Nagares when Aomi chimed once again, "And look into the mirror more often, please! You're pretty -- show my seashell your face every time you have the chance, will you?!"

And that was it.

The last drop of Nekohiko's patience. The moment the door of Aomi's and Kataji's quarters closed, he could not hold himself back anymore.

"Aomi," he gritted out. "What is the meaning of this? Why do you push me onto your Eldest Brother with such vehemence? I do not appreciate these kinds of innuendos!"

"What innuendos?" She shrugged nonchalantly and pattered toward her room to grab towels and bathing items from within wreckage. "I'm going to take a bath in the hot spring. I feel so filthy and sweaty after the battle. You coming?"

"Aomi! Why do you insist on my seashell being worn by His Majesty like that? Why do you want me to see his smile or his..."

--abs? Who even suggests such things?

"Is there something I need to know?" he ended acidly.

"I've no idea. Is there something I need to know? Like the fact that you lied to me about being worn by him?" She twirled the towel on her finger, going out of the room. "I do not appreciate being lied to, Itsssu. Speaking of which." She gave the room a suspicious glance. "Where is my snake? Heck, where is Kataji's cat?"

Nekohiko blanched back, uncomfortable. To be honest, he didn't even know where his bodies were.

Aaaaaargh! Why did he have to have so many bodies?! He had a hard time taking note of them all.

"You didn't take care of Kataji while we were all gone," she said, tsking. "You left him all alone and didn't keep him company. And look what you've done to him? He's depressed and is talking to your unconscious dummy."

Actually, I saved your brother from sure death, he wanted to tell her but didn't want to go there.

Because -- would he tell her about Etsuko, too? And what happened to her and her soldier squads?

And how he, a kitty, had managed to do that?

"Then you lost your bodies we paid real money for and a lot of effort to make... then you lied to me about the only thing I asked you to do -- spy on my Eldest Brother so that I'd know if he was happy or miserable and why?" Her face took a very disappointed, motherly mien. "And now you dare tell me it is I who is doing something weird and in need of explanations? Ah, Itsuki. Your behavior saddens me."

How... how did it happen that he was the one castigated now?

...it was supposed to be the other way around. He'd been the one harassed and embarrassed by her antics. Yet he felt so guilty and so... in the wrong now.

"I... I am sorry," he stammered. "I just didn't like your insinuations about your Eldest Brother and me. It felt as though you suspect something about us, so I wanted to... check..."

"Go and apologize to Kataji," she whispered. "I'll go find your dumb bodies while I'm at it. Where are they?"

It took her no time to lie her way out of staying inside as she tortured her Nagare guards by whining how much she stank after the gruesome battle. Her convoy was smaller than Abihiko's, but not by much. It was clear that Kasuga had given special orders to keep a good eye on Aomi after what had happened.

But Aomi skipped and pranced and complained about losing her toys somewhere outside, so of course some of the Nagares had to run errands for her while all she did was command them.

Nekohiko would stay with her and keep giving her more precise directions to how to find his cat and the no-longer-existing snake body, but he needed to go see Abihiko.

He had no time to spend on anyone else but him. In truth, all his bodies stopped mattering the moment the seashell one had gained a clear view into Abihiko's life.

But he couldn't tell that to Aomi. Not to her. Never.

"Kataji is calling," he said instead. "I have to go."

And thus, he abandoned her and Nagares on a windy balcony overlooking that part of the courtyard beyond which Suzumegara's thorax lay. The sky around them was colored orange and purple and the first stars peeked on the darker horizon. The nighttime would be soon. Abihiko was bound to be too tired to go around and would soon depart to bed.

But when his consciousness popped back into the seashell, all that greeted him was...

 


***

 

...sounds of coughing and retching.

Shocked, Nekohiko stilled to understand his surroundings and found that Abihiko was in the same kind of interior as Kataji's and Aomi's room, only slightly larger and more luxurious in its decorum. Abihiko's heart was pumping and his skin was hot. Hotter than ever.

Gods, Nekohiko had known something really wasn't right with him after that over-the-top power play he'd pulled against Nagares, Towas, and Kasuga on the battlefield. But not to such an extent...

And now that he was thinking about it, the aura of Binding that Abihiko had used to stop the fighting had possessed a distinct flavor of his own. Nekohiko knew what Abihiko's Binding aura felt like. He'd witnessed it so many times. What he didn't understand was why there had not been any trace of the Emperor's power mixed in -- especially when Abihiko had used almost all the Binding methods at once as only the Emperor would be able to do with ease.

Something didn't fit in.

Abihiko reached out with his Binding and probed his insides to rip out something from them. A clot. A knot of bad blood that had been tainted with the corruption of some sort.

With pained revulsion, Nekohiko witnessed as Abihiko spat up another mouthful of black, tainted blood out of his lungs into the glass sink that was in his room.

He couldn't even begin to understand what he was seeing or why. He only knew that none of the Binding spells Abihiko was doing had come to him without heavy sacrifice. Which sort of explained the grim condition his health was in.

But didn't explain how it had come to this...

"Your Supreme Divine Majesty!" a call came from beyond the hallway. "Her Majesty Kasuga demands your audience in the Speaker's Hall. Please let us escort you there right away!"

"Yes..." Abihiko heaved. "Just a moment!"

Abihiko slowly leaned his head against the cool surface of the wall. Sweat and fever had seeped through all the layers of his clothes and rubbed onto Nekohiko, too. And Nekohiko once again thought:

Spirits, Abihiko. Just go to sleep.

Your condition is seriously worrying! There's the bed -- use it, for hell's sake!

He caught himself too late to not feel conflicted at thinking this. Why was he advising his enemy to rest and get better? Shouldn't he be... happy instead?

But nothing in him was happy. He had never felt drearier. Something he wasn't the only one feeling, he reminded himself.

There was one other person in this castle the thoughts of whom depressed him to no end. However uncomfortable the interaction would be with him, Nekohiko had no choice but to do it.

Like Aomi had said -- it was mainly his fault, after all.


***

 

"Kataji," he tried as he emerged in the human dummy's head still tied on top of the other body parts. He didn't like this position and its looks, but there wasn't any other wooden block he could find around that had a mouth and eyes on it. "Kataji, I'm so sorry I didn't come to see if you were all right during the battle."

Or throughout the week.

Or maybe even longer than that.

Kataji's room was brightly-lit. He sat on his bed, cutting out paper mockups for future wooden details of Nekohiko's femurs. He looked so weary yet at the same time busy that Nekohiko's heart felt stabbed.

He didn't deserve this person's attention, did he?

However obsessive Kataji was sometimes being about Nekohiko's future body and future life, he was also only doing what he had promised he would.

Nekohiko had pushed him away because he felt too creeped out by this obsessiveness, but now... he regretted that.

He regretted many things after everything he'd witnessed today.

"Kataji, please..."

"Did everyone else become too busy to spend time with you?"

... "No."

After a moment, Kataji shook his head, upset. "It's not that I needed you to check on me. I'm not that frail. But, Itsuki -- do you have any idea what if felt like to sit here and wait... and pray that you were all right? That these soldiers wouldn't kill you or catch you or... destroy you? I didn't even know if you were alive or dead because you didn't respond."

Gods...

"I don't even know how you survived that terrible woman and her soldiers," Kataji whispered at last. "I don't understand... Just what did you do to them that they didn't kill you and not one of them came back for me afterward?"

"It's too long to explain now, Kataji," Nekohiko began dully.

But Kataji turned to him in full, his face solemn.

"Well, the battle is over for now. We have all the time to talk about it. Unless, of course, you have somewhere more important to be?"

"I do not," Nekohiko lied.

"Itsuki." Kataji leaned in, an earnest expression on his face. "Who are you, actually? A person who can, even in a body of a wooden cat, get rid of half a hundred people and... what? You do not seem worried they would come for you or me again. Why aren't you worried? What happened to those fifty people, Itsuki?"

Nekohiko felt abnormally weightless. As though suspended on a very thin string that could rip any moment.

"It's a battlefield, Kataji. I was simply lucky that Suzumegara spun so much and that there were plenty of Towa soldiers I could lead all these Nagares to. I didn't have to do a thing. The battlefield mostly did it for me," he said very carefully.

This was awful. He was lying to so many people about so many different things.

By now, he was spread thin not only consciousness-wise but also sanity-wise. He had no idea how much he could keep going without his brain exploding from so many little lies tangling him from all sides. And with all these people -- Abihiko, Aomi, Kasuga, Mikawa, Kataji -- gathered in the same space and interacting with one another...

It certainly felt like a ring of fire was slowly closing in on him.

He starkly understood that, alone, he wouldn't be able to withstand it.

"The thing is, Kataji, that I can't... explain. I don't understand a lot of these things myself. Who Bound me to a tree, why? Who is my enemy and who isn't? It's so... hard, I feel like going mad. I only know I have to survive and try my chance at a better, purer life. A real life as a human being. That's what I want most. I'm so sorry I can't always talk to you about it. I still feel confused about many parts of my new life so I don't feel the need to share it all..."

Another lie, and such a dirty one -- because of course it would toy with Kataji's heartstrings. He knew how Kataji wanted to give him a decent human existence. So he used that against Kataji.

If he wasn't so desperate, he would feel ashamed.

Kataji put his papers and shears away. His legs had indeed been healed well enough that he could kneel in front of Nekohiko.

"You don't need to apologize, Itsuki," he said, gulping in worry. "I understand. That's what I also want. Like I promised you. To give you a decent body and a decent life."

"Yes. And to aid with that, I think we shouldn't tell about the incident with Nagare soldiers to Aomi or your brother," Nekohiko went on, whispery. "It would be too hard to explain."

Kataji nodded, grave. "Or to Kasuga," he said with vivid distaste. "As long as Eldest Brother is here, nothing bad will ever happen to me. I am sure of that. So the less we communicate with that Nagare girl the better."

That Nagare girl.

Ah, was Kataji still so pissed Kasuga had demanded a piece of Nekohiko's wood for herself?

Nekohiko played into it.

"Not even to Mikawa," he said to Kataji's animated nod. "The fewer people know, the safer you and I are. After all, you are the first person I met in this world and the first to be so kind as to help me. To me, you are special, Kataji. I trust you the most."

"Mn," Kataji could only reply.

Oh, but how happy Kataji looked just to talk to Nekohiko about their secrets no one else was allowed into... If Nekohiko had felt bad before, now he very nearly wanted to kick himself for ever getting involved with these people so much.

Because however nice this little conversation with Kataji was getting -- his seashell form picked up the sounds of decisive footsteps going somewhere.

Abihiko was walking toward Kasuga to have their military meeting to discuss the situation above Hamamatsu and Fuji. And Nekohiko had to be there.

But... Kataji...

...

"Itssssu, we still can't find it! Can you specify where exactly your bodies are again?" Aomi's drawling voice pecked at him from somewhere else, too.

...

"Queen Kasuga said there is an urgent visitor who needs to speak to Your Supreme Divine Majesty and her at the same time," the Nagare councillor who escorted Abihiko was saying, his nasal voice reverberating through Nekohiko's seashell body so unpleasantly.

...

And here --

Kataji slowly blinked, then narrowed his eyes peering at Nekohiko's wooden block.

"Itsuki. Are you... spacing out? Is something wrong?" Kataji asked him, so disconcerted that Nekohiko wanted to ease all his worries down that same moment.

Nekohiko shut his eyes and wished he could shut his ears, too.

This was... pure information torture.

From all sides! These people demanded his focus from all sides!

"I am... fine," he lied, shuddering top to bottom. Then, after a long and weary breath, "Kataji... I need to go. I'm sorry. Aomi really wants my help in finding my cat body."

"You lost it?" Kataji nodded, then gave him another patient smile. "Go. I can wait."

Yet instead of going to Aomi, he... didn't.

He didn't go to Abihiko either. Not straight away.

He just felt so... utterly... tired.

He had only three bodies in different places and with different people, each of whom had an extremely high priority for him. Yet just these three had worn him and all of his attention out. He felt nearly collapsing, mentally and physically.

...

Abihiko's convoy stopped, their heavy-booted footsteps clanging loudly in the glassy halls. The great double doors of the conference hall swung open before Abihiko. A rush of light poured at him and the seashell from beyond the threshold.

"His Supreme Divine Majesty Abihiko!" the Nagare councilor announced.

Kasuga's reserved voice answered it from somewhere within the enormous, echoing hall. "Good. This matter requires the utmost urgency and attention. Your Supreme Divine Majesty?"

Abihiko nodded as he walked on into the room.

But Nekohiko, hanging off his neck, could only think to himself -- exactly as Abihiko had done several minutes earlier back in his empty, cold bathroom:

Just a moment. Just a moment more.

I need to rest.

I need to gather my thoughts.

Can any of you just please... wait?

A. Single. Moment. More?

Yet like with Abihiko's case, no matter how sick or how exhausted he was -- the Imperial business had to go on. And both of them had to be present and aware and engaged.

Abihiko stopped beside Kasuga. The girl gave him a glance, then both of them turned to the two other people waiting in the middle of the room.

Both were dressed in the travel clothes, but the Izumo uniform travel garb was still recognizable regardless of how thick the layer of dust or grime was on it. The young woman's pearly-grey robes showed her high status in the Izumo Shrine School -- one of the most trusted assistants directly beneath the Head Priest.

When she raised her eyes at Abihiko and couldn't help smiling, Nekohiko felt as though his heart skipped a beat.

And such a sweet beat it was!

Kotone!

"His Holiness Head Priest of Izumo needs to speak to you both," Kotone said to Kasuga and Abihiko and stepped aside to let the tall, elegant figure in white-and-black clothes behind her to have the direct view to the Emperor and the Queen.

This direct view must have been very disappointing.

Suminoe's icy-cold eyes flicked from one to the other.

"Will anyone explain to me what is going on in this forsaken place?" he asked them, barely restraining his wrath.

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