disclaimer: disclaimed.
dedication: to les, on her birthday.
notes: this is the worst birthday present ever, but I'm making up for it with the other one

title: no such thing as justice (the best we can hope for is revenge)
summary: Close your eyes. Count to ten. — Izumo/Renzou.

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"I'm not even angry," she says. "Not really."

This is, of course, a lie. He's in cuffs at her feet with his mouth taped. Of course she's angry. Izumo wears white, and drinks tea. Her hands do not tremble when she sets the bone china cup down. It does not make a sound against the gleaming wooden tabletop.

"Really, Renzou," she says. "I'm not."

He watches her like he's the one with the power here. His eyes linger on the curve of her cheek—Renzou always had been something of a womanizer (or at least he'd tried), and she'd always been beautiful. Izumo is not naïve; that is Shiemi's area of expertise, and Izumo has no desire to encroach on that territory.

She is too old and too tired for naivety.

Betrayal does that to a person.

"You know, it's funny. I thought we'd be together forever, all of us," Izumo muses. "Even Okumura. We were all—I don't know the word. Happy?"

She pauses to sip at her tea. It still steams thinly. Her lips leave no mark; she might not have been there at all.

"But not you. And that's sad."

Renzou doesn't make a sound. His hair is a shout of colour against the tatami floor, fluorescent cotton candy pink in a room stripped nearly entirely of colour. Izumo reaches down to touch it, runs her fingers through his fringe. They'd never had this, before, and she knows she would not have it long now.

"They wanted to kill you," she says, idly. "Did you know? The Vatican would have been okay with killing you. Letting Rin kill you, actually. Like that's not the most screwed up thing ever. I would say they're cruel, but…"

Izumo trails off, shrugging a little. Her kimono slips off her shoulder, not tied correctly, not tight enough around the waist. She's lost weight in the intervening months and her hair, loose out of its pigtails, falls to the floor around them in a gleaming dark sheet. She sits like a statue.

"Actually, they still want to kill you."

He hums, this time, and she fights the urge to hit him. She thinks he can see it on her face, because his eyes crinkle up, though they're empty. The smell of blood is thick in the air, pumping like a factory. Maybe it's just her heart. She can't tell.

"I won't do that to Okumura," she says, suddenly soft. "That's not fair. You were his first friend. But me? I don't have qualms about that. We're not friends, are we."

It's not really a question. Renzou's shoulder shake with muted laughter.

Izumo reaches down, and pulls the tape off.

"Fuck, sweetheart, kill a man," his pain is almost a tangible thing, ripped out of him. "You tryna kill me?"

"That was the deal, actually," Izumo smiles, but it's not a kind thing. "I talk to you last. Only one us leaves this room."

"I thought you didn't kill humans."

The you meant the Vatican, not Izumo personally. Izumo didn't think a lot of people ought to have been allowed to live. This wouldn't be the first time. Probably wouldn't be the last, either—Tamers were prized for their detachment.

"I don't," she says. "Not people, anyway."

"Fighting words, sweet," Renzou laughs like a smoker, all hacking-raspy. He curls in on himself, pushed upwards until his head rests against her leg. "So, what, you gonna gank me?"

"Better me than Rin," she says easily.

"He'd be fine," Renzou shrugs, moving his shoulders an inch up and down. The cuffs don't leave for much movement room, not comfortably, so he stays there with his head in her lap for a minute.

"Probably," Izumo says, reasonably, because killing is what they all do best. Children playing war, and none of them had an idea what was coming. Religion is a cruel mistress. "They're all still hurt."

"And you, beautiful?"

"I told you," she says. "I'm not angry."

"Then why?"

Izumo looks down at him, gaze burning against his for the first time in a long time. There is nothing in her eyes but a ferocious hungry emptiness, and it reflects between them mirroring back and for minutes or hours or possibly several cold winter days. She doesn't tell him to look at her and see what he's done—oh no, he knows, he knows, he has to know.

"Because no one else has the right," she smiles, and it cuts like a knife. "That's why. Look at the beast you've made of me, Renzou."

"Love you, too, sweetheart."

"I don't care."

"Good," Renzou says. "That's good."

"No, it isn't. It's the worst," Izumo says. Her voice goes gentle, breaking somewhere in the middle. "Close your eyes. Count to ten. It won't hurt at all, I promise."

He does.

(It's a good thing she's not a liar.)

"Love you," he says again, eyes closed.

She puts the gun right to his heart.

Bang.

—

Izumo stays there for a long time, red congealing on her kimono. The fabric is ruined; she'll have to burn the thing. Better than the alternative, she thinks distantly.

She drinks her tea.

She doesn't look down.

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fin.