The Re-Forging of the Blade

**Chapter Eight**
The Sweat of the Sword Maker Glistens like Steel

Jinpachi Mishima walked between the worlds, his spirit a fleeting thing as incorporeal bare feet connected to ether and earth. The pulse of darkness shifted in his veins as the tip of his tongue leapt out to taste the bindings of his ethereal cage…to the world he could influence but not step fully into.

“The son is dead…and the son of the son rises up…and the blood of his blood…has returned. I will find freedom…I will find power…at the desolation of their bodies…so soon to crumble to the demons awaiting below….my freedom from imprisonment...will rise…as they fall!”

**

Hwoarang parked his bike, one hand wrapping around his stomach as the other swung his keys into the pocket of his buckled jeans. Freshly showered and forced to eat something as Chang watched, the Blood Talon fought off sickness as hard as he could...though the pain was creeping up on him as every hour passed. The phone call came to Chaolan somewhere after Chang left…midnight, the witching hour…and the Silver Devil was ready to accept his company.

Drawing up the stairs to the penthouse loft, the Korean hissed his breath, fighting waves of nausea as he moved. Every step was pain…every motion…agony. Finally making it to the top, Hwoarang let fingerless gloves connect to a solid wood frame.

“You’re running late,” Chaolan said, parting the portal as he slid back, a glass of cognac in his grip. His blue silk robe was tied at the waist, exposing black leather trousers beneath…a cool smirk riding his lips to match the silk along his skin.

“Took the stairs. Don’t want to be seen,” the Korean hissed as he stepped in slowly, eyes nearly clenched at the agony writhing through his skin. He drew onto the couch he had sat in the night before, freshly washed copper tendrils clinging to the leather. “Something is wrong with me…It didn’t feel this way…when I drank his blood.”

Perceptive little bitch, Chaolan hissed in his thoughts, his mind working like gears of a machine to find a decent explanation. “You are receiving a potent dose rather than ingesting and digesting it through your bloodstream. It’s bound to make the effects significantly pronounced…” Lee closed the door, taking a heavy draught of his libation, though his eyes never left the Blood Talon. “Are you ready for your blood draw?”

The Korean youth looked up with painful eyes, the fire rim along the edges of sienna burned like a hearth’s glow. “My arm already looks like it belongs to a fucking Junkie, Chaolan…why are you doing this?”

“We have already covered that, haven’t we, Hwoarang?” Lee snickered, opening the black case kept in the same location as last evening. He set his cognac snifter down and withdrew the necessary implements once more. “Though I must say, your eye is healing quite well from last evenings…punishment. I believe the Demon’s blood is changing you over…at last.”

“I don’t want to fuck you…” the Blood Talon hissed, his energy drained from the long climb of the stairs…his words truthful as the guilt of last evenings indiscretions washed over him.

“Correction. It is I, who does the fucking. Don’t you recall our agreement? If you do not give to me what I desire, then I can not give to you…what it is you need to survive.” Lee placed the alcohol wipes, rubber band and two syringes once more on the coffee table.

“I could do something else for you…I could rough some people up…bring in troops from Korea. I just…” Hwoarang closed his eyes, letting free a groan of agony as Lee sat down beside him.

“You just what? Had some guilt about your dead lover? You could equally join him if you wish, though this gift was asked of me to deliver to you…you would not disgrace Jin…would you?” The Silver Devil tore open the first alcohol pad, holding it aloft as his eyes turned to the tortured Hwoarang’s. To love and believe that person lost…was painful…a pain almost delicious to Chaolan’s curved ear.

“No…I would not disgrace him,” Hwoarang said as a pang of agony wove just beneath his skin. Jin, is this what you wanted from me? Is this how you intend to keep me closer to you, even in death? Do you want me to be strong for this gift? I will…baby. I promise, I will.

“Are we continuing?” Lee asked as he breathed heavily out of his nose. “I have other appointments to attend to than your…addictions, you realize. Certainly more important than the poor payment I receive from my attentions. Are you in, as last evening, or are we done for the night?” He feigned impatience.

“We are continuing…” the Korean youth hissed, offering his right arm to Chaolan’s knee. The bandages that wound around the flesh went from wrist to the bend of the elbow…but the vein was still accessible.

“Have you hurt yourself in his name, Hwoarang?” Lee licked his lips, imagining whatever agony had brought the Korean youth to injury. Such delightful pain, such perfect guilt…the idea made him crave to feel that skin burn beneath him.

“I hurt myself...to ask forgiveness.” Hwoarang winced as the rubber band cut off circulation to his arm….the prick of the needle strong into his skin, draining out life force to test the progression of the Devil Gene inside of him. It’s Jin’s gift. He bore it for years…and he gave it to me…I have to show I can take it…the same way I took every punch, every kick and block…in the back alleys of Korea…years ago. I have to take it…for him…

Lee snickered and withdrew the blue rubber banding around Hwoarang’s arm with a heavy snap. “How delicious of you to try and seek penance in the memory of your dead lover. It borders on debauchery.”

The Silver Devil drew up to retrieve his already powder lined mirror, offering the pre-rolled yen and contents to the Blood Talon, setting it before him. “Take two lines, Hwoarang. Tonight…is going to be far more difficult to bear than the last…and the syringe you need is waiting…”

Leaning up slowly, the Korean youth drew the rolled up yen to his nostril…leaning in to the offered mirror set before him before taking a line deep into each nostril. With a heavy hiss, the chemical drip rolled down his throat, numbing the sensations as Lee added more powder to the reflective surface.

With sharp nails, Chaolan drew the next set of lines, taking the yen from the youth’s fingers before inhaling thickly with a slow moan. Smiling with implied lasciviousness, the elder Korean raised the blood filled syringe…and rolled it heavily between his palms. The friction created in the motion…warmed the blood about to be injected into Hwoarang’s willing skin….

**

Jin opened his eyes slowly, the dark sky was still intense enough to his regained senses that he could barely cope. Japanese soil brushed his naked torso and the shiver made his spine wince enough that he forced his hands to move…and draw over him the borrowed sweat suit jacket that had been tied loosely to his waist.

The Demon was eerily quiet as Jin tried his best to gather his bearing. Trees. Black figures of breathing brilliance amidst the night…somewhere, he rested in a forest area that was as dark as it was beautiful. Safe as it was foreboding.

Every last storage of energy had gone from his body and his spirit as he closed his eyes. “Almost to you, Seung. Hold on, just a little longer…wherever you are….I will come for you…”

Falling into the slumber of pure exhaustion, Jin went into a place where even the demon could not touch him…to the depths of heaven where he offered himself to the night and to his ancestors…if only to protect Hwoarang just one more hour...one more day, until he was free of the soul draining effects of the Demon’s flight. Words of the Japanese youth’s fathomless dreams formed inside his mouth…as the waving leaves of summer trees fell against his lips, like a matron’s accepting kiss.

“Mother…protect him...he is my mate…and the son you have yet to love…”

**

“Come on, just wait a little longer. Hwoarang is never one to miss a good party.” Ling shivered as a cool breeze wafted through her skin, brought by the tides not far away, or so she believed.

“Did you even invite him out tonight to this club opening?” Julia asked, warming her hands against her nearly bare shoulders.

“Well, I did tell him about it…” Ling said defensively.

“There shouldn’t be a need to invite Hwoarang, trust me. The extravagance alone should have brought him by now. Can’t bloody wait outside all night…the breath from the piers are fuckin’ cold, no matter how warm it’s supposed to be.” Steve shivered, tossing the menthol he had captured between his fingers to the ground.

“I hate the fact that you smoke,” Julia shrugged, stepping on the burning end with her trail boots. “You know this will kill you.”

“Going to die of the frigid temperature either way love, how can it be the dawn of summer and yet so bloody cold? Let’s go inside and warm ourselves with drink. If Hwoarang is going to show, he won’t be out here for long. Korea isn’t nearly this cold,” Steve grimaced, turning to open the door and shield himself form the chill breeze. “Bloody Japanese weather.”

“You both go inside. I am going to wait a little while longer, just incase. This club has been advertised all over Japan, it’s opening night. If that doesn’t attract his attentions, I just don’t know what will.” Ling held her hands against her upper arms in the already skimpy outfit she wore.

“We will order you a drink. Don’t wait too long, alright? I mean, it is possible he had more important things to do?” Julia said, leaving her last comment open ended as she followed to the door Steve held open.

“I will be in soon enough. Don’t worry about me, alright?” Ling said, her tone enthusiastic, even if her spirit possessed none of it. Julia joined her boyfriend and the door closed quickly behind them, pushed by the breeze.

“Hwoarang. Where are you?” Ling asked, searching out along the water…and in that moment…a strange feeling…of pain and tiredness...the kind of tiredness that comes from the soul itself, washed over her. Blinking her eyes rapidly, the Chinese youth let her back lean against the outer wall of the club beside the downtown Tokyo pier. “I don’t think I feel so well…” Ling grimaced, clearing her throat. “Come on Hwoarang…what’s gotten into you? Please don’t be with that guy…be here...with me...instead.”

**

“Fuck!” The Blood Talon cried out as the bamboo was repeatedly levied against his skin repeatedly. “Hurts…..” the Korean youth hissed, face down on the bed…tied with leather at the wrists and ankles…open and at the mercy of his tormenter. The sensation was so complete, so dark…so like his last nights with Jin. Jin….

“Deliciously so,” Lee groaned, licking his lips as bated breath passed the velvet softness at the delicious slap of stem against skin. The wounds that opened seeped exquisite blood against the Korean youth’s pleading flesh. “Surely you do not yield yet?”

“No…” Hwoarang cried out, his fingers gripping into the icy bed sheets he was bound against. The splintered ends of strong bamboo recalled to his thoughts the Juk-Bi…the ceremonial instrument that beat against his palm till bloody, in the moments he begged for clarity after learning Jin’s secrets. Pleasure and pain battled once more beneath his skin as all thoughts made his dead lover real...made Jin live and breath again…

Almost to you, Seung. Hold on, just a little longer…wherever you are….I will come for you…

“I’m here baby…Jin, don’t leave me!” Hwoarang cried out with hissed breath, tears at the rim of his eyes. He could hear the words of his lover buried in the back of his thoughts as though the Japanese youth whispered them with warm breath against his ear…and that simple imagined connection was enough to drive him into madness…and into the arms of blackness.

“Jin is not here, Hwoarang…there is only payment owed to me!” Lee purred, as the Korean youth stilled his previous struggles, fingers drawn outward to an incorporeal lover at the edge of the bed….fire rimmed sienna utterly blank as Chaolan inspected his captive lover thoroughly…only to realize the Korean youth was no longer conscious.

“Well, this certainly complicates the session,“ Lee snickered. Hwoarang was breathing deeply, sweat and blood glistening from his abused back. The sudden instinct overcame the Silver Devil that the Japanese scion was close and had spoken directly into the Korean youth’s mind. Perhaps Jin had returned, sensing his lover’s pain? Perhaps the blood heir to demonic strength was finally near to the source of the matter…and Kazuya’s revenge? And at last, Chaolan wondered if the connection between the Japanese youth and his Korean lover…was deeper than the devil gene, the infection they now shared.

Leaning down to the end table beside the bed, Lee lifted the cordless phone and dialed familiar numbers. “You may wish to join me at the loft. It seems we have a problem with our lab rat.”

**

Kazuya braced his leather trench coat over his arm as Chaolan closed the door behind him. “What have you done to him and why was I not notified he would be here at this late hour?”

“Do you wish a personal invite to each and every session I hold?” Lee huffed, taking a sip of the cognac from the snifter in his grip. “Hwoarang has lost consciousness….”

“By your inability to properly dominate him, undoubtedly. Your skills leave much to be desired, or so I have witnessed,” Kazuya interrupted Chaolan’s sentiment as he rested his jacket down on the arm of the sofa. “Drugs are not a requirement for sex, Chaolan. The sooner you learn it, the better the control on your whipping hand will be.”

“You misunderstand the nature of things, Kazuya. Always hasty to find an explanation.” Lee pursed his lips, walking past Kazuya to lift the mirror of fine, pale yellow powdered lines that rested on the surface…careful not to disturb a grain as he set the paraphernalia on the mantle. “Hwoarang, it seems, has heard the voice of your son.”

Kazuya arched a brow as he withdrew his sunglasses, a necessary apparatus to hide the glowing red of his demonic eye day or night. “And you know this how?”

Lee tightened his silk robe about his waist, the material dangling against the leather of his pants. “He replied to a voice that was not present as though speaking to Jin himself. A moment later, he was unconscious. I doubt highly that his pain tolerance is so low he could not take a proper caning…unless of course you would have rather I not called you?”

Kazuya took a deep, impatient breath. Turning from Chaolan, he walked through the loft toward the bedroom and opened the door into the large expanse. Hwoarang was lying, prone and exposed…face down on the bed and bound with leather restraints to wrists and ankles. “How long has he been unconscious?”

Lee followed, snifter in hand. “Forty-five minutes. I have tried to rouse him but nothing has seemed to work. His pulse is strong, respirations steady…but he does not rouse.”

Kazuya drew up along the bed, eyes scanning appraisingly down the Korean youth’s naked flesh. Age and innocence were still clinging to Hwoarang’s open sienna eyes. The youth was not yet even in his prime and yet for that partial and hidden purity, there was a jaded sense that seeped through the street punk’s very pores. If he had not been Korean, Kazuya would have thought the youth almost beautiful.

“Has he had a second injection?” Dark eyes turned to Chaolan, as Kazuya walked along to the other side of the bed, inspecting the Korean youth closely for the already visible track marks on the right outstretched arm.

“An hour and a half ago, perhaps two,” Lee said as he leaned back against the wall, crossing his ankles and lighting up a cigarette. “It is difficult to keep track of time when something so lovely is writhing in pain and pleasure on your bed.”

Kazuya ignored the comment and trailed his eyes along the dark stains of blood that leaked like spilled ink against the white canvas of Korean flesh. “And there was no difference from the first and second injection? No reactions out of the ordinary?”

“Nothing that would denote a problem.” Lee flicked the ash into the receptacle near the door, a lovely standing sculpture of ceramic meant to cloak the actual use of the piece. The Silver Devil blinked rapidly when he felt the staunch chill of unnatural energy fill the room, a sign of the Devil’s presence growing. “What do you sense?”

Kazuya’s gleaming red eye scanned Hwoarang’s skin once more before a clawed hand reached out over the Korean’s body…absorbing the energy the unconscious Blood Talon released, perceptible only to darker senses.

//The blood is being consumed, the gene attempting to battle against a stronger adversary. If Jin has spoken to his spirit, the initial infection would seem to have awakened.//

Kazuya lowered his clawed hand and turned his eyes to Chaolan. “Jin is near. Near enough to him now to have awoken whatever hold the gene held upon him before our interference. Hwoarang will need more if we are to overpower his blood. His ties to Kazama Jin are strong…but not unbreakable.”

Lee exhaled sharply, unnerved as that glittering red eye fell on him. “You want me to transfuse him? Kazuya that is madness! The boy can barely handle what he receives in doses….the simple fact that neither you or Jin are the same blood type as he is…and his ability to digest it, shows just how fragile the process is. Too much and his own blood will attack itself…it could very well kill him.”

“You already knew this to be reality, Lee. You knew the sickness would get increasingly worse and not just from the devil gene but from the altering of his blood type….And from his state, I see it has indeed progressed. We need to speed that progression further.” Kazuya gave a dark smile as he straightened his suit jacket. “Hwoarang’s life has been nothing but bait in the trap. His death, surely you realize, was a rather fortunate inevitability?”

For the first time since the inception of this plan, Lee Chaolan was doubting just how far he could go. Loyal to Kazuya after abandoning his adopted brother to aid Heihachi’s plans…by now, he had surely paid his penance. “I cannot be a part of that, Kazuya. His death will not be on my hands.”

“His blood already is on your hands…as mine had once been. To whom do you owe loyalty, Chaolan? If you think to turn your back on me now, everything you love, everything you hold sacred…will burn…all around you,” Kazuya hissed as he drew toward Lee, his clawed nails bracing under the Silver Devil’s chin, forcing almond eyes to meet the darkness of his own…eyes like black tides rippling against a forbidden shore till Chaolan could no longer see his own reflection. “If you fail me now, I will rip your heart from its tender ribcage…with my very nails.”

**

Ling turned as the door to the back entrance of the club swung open, catching her off guard. Her hand braced to her throat as she breathed in the deep, cold air that rose from the pier. “Steve. You scared me! Don’t you dare do that again!” Without another word, the Chinese youth punched the boxer resoundingly in the upper arm.

“Sorry,” Steve laughed, rubbing the spot Ling had hit, through his red leather jacket, the blue piping moving with his hand. “Still no sign, eh?”

“Nothing. I really thought he might show up. Something just keeps telling me to check…” Ling gave a soft sigh as Steve tried to light his cigarette. The Chinese youth cupped her hands over the large paws of the Boxer’s, helping to shield that flame.

“Thanks.” Steve inhaled sharply, tilting his head back as the cold wind slid through previously sweat drenched platinum tendrils. The warmth in the club, from the heat of both bodies and strobes, was a far cry from the world out of doors. “You know Ling, I think it’s honorable of you to not give up on him. Hwoarang can be a bit of a git sometimes…”

“I’m not the only one who isn’t giving up on him or you would have had that cigarette inside,” Ling smiled. “He has a good friend in you. And you have a good girl in Julia. I think you made the right choice.”

“Well, the choice was already made soon as Jin stepped back into the picture. But you’re right, ya know, Julia does make me happy,” Steve said as he returned the smile. “After my smoke we have to get you inside or you’ll end up catching your death out here. Bloody Japanese weather, can’t make up its mind.”

“It’s only because we are near the water. It’s always cold near the water…” Ling cleared her throat as the wind blew the menthol taste into her mouth.

Steve snickered and drew in another drag. “The water off the pier is dark enough that it just absorbs everything, including your reflection...could drive you crazy staring too long into it. Black water is like the end of the world.”

“Come on, let’s get back inside before you wax philosophical, again. I don’t think I have had enough to drink to handle another line.” Ling rolled her eyes with a laugh, her hand reaching the iron grip of the door and held it aloft as the Boxer finished his cigarette.

**

Lee Chaolan breathed deep as he finished dressing Hwoarang on the bed. The Korean youth had been washed clean to remove the evidence as Kazuya sipped a snifter of Cognac in the living room.

Never had the Silver Devil truly believed Kazuya would go this far. Hwoarang was meant to be the bait, a possible ally brought forcefully to the Original Devil’s side to rally against Jin. Death…was never a factor in Chaolan’s designs, careful to administer only a certain amount of blood through the syringe as not to endanger the Korean youth to this point. Hwoarang was much like himself before the Silver Devil had become so jaded. Both drawn into the web of darkness so deep it sanctified the theory of hell and made it a reality.

Now, it was too late for Hwoarang, much as it had been for Lee so many years ago. Kazuya had fed the unconscious youth with his own fresh blood…taken from the wrist where the font was stronger after a large gash was made in the flesh. Chaolan had no experience with transfusion…and no equipment for such a procedure…and realizing this, Kazuya forced Lee to massage the throat muscles of the unconscious youth as he fed the mouth full of his blood. The volume of blood was too much…the change would be too drastic…unpredictable…

“He will live through this, Chaolan. Long enough to ensnare his lover and bait Jin into my grip.” Kazuya spoke quietly, leaning in the doorway to the bedroom as the Silver Devil startled at the voice that should have been in the other room. Kazuya lifted the snifter of cognac to his lips as the tendons in his right arm screamed. The wound on his wrist was nearly healed from the incision, but the soreness was still evident. Even a Demon was not above pain.

The Silver Devil drew the unconscious Hwoarang upward from the bed, one hand holding around the Korean youth’s waist, allowing the Blood Talon’s arm to drape along his neck. “Where are we taking him?” Lee ignored Kazuya’s words. “The hotel? Or his apartment? You know how to get to his place, right?”

“He needs to be somewhere he can be found and treated, kept alive. A place with a good deal of presence, perhaps?” Kazuya insinuated as he finished the cognac and walked back into the living room. Setting the glass down as he drew his coat up along his arms.

“Club Dominion.” Lee said, keeping Hwoarang braced to his hip. Someone would have to recognize him there…it’s his crowd, his scene…his age group.

“The club you invested a ridiculous sum of yen into? Truly, Chaolan, you are a sad old man longing for childhood,” Kazuya sneered and grasped the unconscious Korean from the Silver Devil’s hold. With a show of strength, the Middle Aged Mishima drew Hwoarang over his shoulder as though bracing a sack of potatoes. “Was this street rat worth missing your own opening?”

“Yes…and no,” Chaolan hissed, drawing on his own aviator leather jacket, hand tailored to his body. Taking his keys into hand, he opened the door for Kazuya and his cargo.

Kazuya turned to scan the Silver Devil’s almond eyes. “Be careful, Chaolan. I fear you might be growing attached to our subject. I would hate to think of the guilt you will feel at the moment of his expiration and the part you have played in its arrival.”

“I know where my loyalties lie, Kazuya. It will be light soon. Let’s go.” Lee breathed out deeply, locking the door to his loft as he steeled his resolve. What was done, is done. I can’t change it now…not for Hwoarang…and not for myself.