[ Do you believe in your words? Mizael asks, and...

(does he?)

(what does he believe in at all?)

(in barian sekai no tame ni?)

(their world will die no matter what they do)

(in his hatred for Tsukumo Yuuma, certainly, that vicious anchoring to the reality he builds for himself, but beyond that...)

Mizael is pressing that human flesh to the gem and Vector feels sick but that--

That's human, base and disgusting and wrong, and that-- is that what Mizael is doing? Mizael can't provide him with starlight so he drowns Vector in the stench of him, all human muck and mess, until Vector could choke on it or choke him or--

(reject me, Mizael says, and)

Vector's arms flash up and he's pushing Mizael down, bringing him down low to sit atop him on the ground. Let his human filth drag in the dirt, let him be brought low because doesn't this form bring him low enough as it is? How much lower can Vector even drag this stinking, heavy creature when it used to burn so bright and now must claw at Vector's gems to so much as spark? ]

Reject you?

I'll do more than reject you.

[ He presses claws into the skin of Mizael's face; pressing, testing, but never quite breaking even the fragile human flesh.

(he could split it like tissue paper if he so chose but he does not choose, at least not yet)

(he is not the uncontrolled creature the others believe him to be; Vector is so very, very controlled when he wants to be, and so he presses his claws in to the very limit but never quite breaks the skin) ]

I won't-- I won't reject you. I'll destroy you, Mizael.

I'll...

[ His fingers slip down, slow and dragging, until he's tracing his claws over the gold of Mizael's lapis but never letting them touch the gem itself.

Perhaps if he splits Mizael apart, he'll burn as bright as a human is capable. Perhaps there will come a moment where Mizael burns even half as bright as his star.

(don't the humans look their best in suffering?)

(hadn't Yuuma's agony driven Vector's light into a frenzy, left him singing sharp and loud with his delight so that it echoed from the stars themselves even in Sargasso where they don't shine?)

(doesn't he still thrum with need, doesn't he still ache with being torn away from Sargasso before he could finish the job and destroy Yuuma entirely?)

(he'll channel that into Mizael, then, and perhaps for a moment at least he'll stop feeling so

empty)

(would he even know completeness if it came, when that emptiness has plagued him every moment that he can think of?)

(is that emptiness truly what it means to be Barian?) ]