Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Fiction
vr 3.00
2008-02-16
"Against Life" by Abraxas | 2006-10-31
Chapter Two
From peasants to emperors, everyone everywhere engages their own, particular hobby. Even the fiercest samurai practices verses and arranges flowers. The damned and detestable also pass their time with their art. Is it a shock? Why should it not be with the evil as with the good?
Entering that chamber not as an interloper but as an apprentice, I was immersed into a world human beings cannot understand. Where I would have been rejected by mankind, there I was embraced and accepted. Where I would have been marginalized and ignored, there I was a collaborator, a needed and sought-for colleague. I must be clear about this: I was not Naraku’s equal – I was neither demon nor autonomous – but I was the master’s loyal and trusted ally and therefore I was given more freedom than would be expected, especially when my status was compared with his own unearthly offspring.
Outside I was his instrument to toy and play with as he pleased. Inside we were like father and son. And like a parent teaching their secrets to their young, he was thoughtful of the way he exposed the practice and taught the art form. It must be seen to be disbelieved, these vagaries of my confessions, doubtless it contradicts your notions of what Naraku was in public and private life. Nevertheless, as the sole, surviving witness my existence attests the truth of my statements.
Since I did not see the art at work my master introduced it bit by bit. He unveiled his whole secret and hidden collection and let me examine with my own, two hands samples that would not be harmful. He showed me samples that lived through the final operations and those that did not that way my mind would be prepared for the trauma of watching – and performing – the acts. And I asked questions: would they be freed and if so would they survive? Were they independent or somehow, someway, were they connected to him?
But it was the way the art was sculpted that became the basis of my education and obsession. Of that methodology already I surmised a few, key particulars. Clearly, the animals had been cut open and reworked at the most fundamental level. That much I understood from what I saw, the rest I learned from what he demonstrated. The body and its various internal operations were among the first, important lessons he taught me. All bodies of all animals were identical, he said, differing by species here and there only with respect to the sizes and locations of those internal parts. The second, equally profound knowledge involved the plasticity of the flesh – its ability to be shaped into whatever form desired by the artist.
Step-by-step I fathomed the beauty of the simplicity of Naraku’s new art: just like a bonsai is trained by careful trimming so, too, can the form and function of animals be sculpted by the cutting and grafting of flesh and bone.
I said I was given a kind of freedom: I was allowed roam from the castle to the forests, alone and unwatched, through the daylight. Daylight. And no one, not Kagura, not Kanna, was as unfettered as I was. Of course, my newfound responsibilities were the cause for my reprieve but my work within the field was simple and often I spent hours lazing about the wilderness taking notes and making observations of Nature’s sub-par handiwork.
The fieldwork itself was setting traps and hunting samples. Sometimes there were lists of animals to be acquired. Sometimes there were not and he and I picked through the catch for the best elements.
Once a subject was selected, it was placed into a cage and set within a basin of fogy, vaporous fluid that immobilized it. As a human I was forced to be careful the way I placed the sample into and out of the basin and how I touched the sample after it had been doused as the alchemy was potent enough to paralyze my body. Once the creature was asleep it was placed upon a cloth of silk that was fitted onto a slab of earth and clay. The mouth was secured with the aid of a muzzle (the demon possessed muzzles of various shapes and sizes) and the claws were snapped. The limbs were either pinned if they were small or chained if they were large.
With the subject secure the work started. It should be noted that the fluid’s effect could be reversed by trauma – the reason for the precaution ought to be clear – therefore as knives were inserted into flesh there came, invariably, spasmodic movements and guttural shrieks. Systematically, from the outside to the inside, the physiology was altered. Strips of hide, chunks of flesh, muscles and vessels, still alive and functional were strewn about the silk and kept moist by the earth-clay substrate.
He trained me first by showing then by talking then by letting me cut and sew those innards into new and different arrangements. The lesson of the entrails was followed by the lesson of the skeleton and hide. Bones were dealt with two ways: they could be cracked and the pieces could be used to create new bones or fuse old bones or they could be sliced and grafted with other parts. Thus by adjusting the frame of the bones the shape of the body was reworked. Flesh was like a combination of filler and glue to give the physiology mass and keep it cohesive.
All the while I noted with reverence the fact that blood never, ever, stained Naraku. It simply dripped off of his fingers as if afraid to be absorbed. I was not so fortunate, however, my physiology was not as advanced as his was.
And when the work was finished, I stepped into the darkness while he drew into the light, and there upon the slab, illuminated by drifting tendrils of torchlight and shadow, was the art. I stood awestruck at the power of my master. What had been a common rat, a dog or a cat, even a bird, was now and forever sculpture. It was genius. It was immortal. What a thing to be realized: that just by surpassing Nature’s artistry we could be greater than Nature itself.
I said I was awed. But that word is not enough and no other word native to language is enough to convey to you what I felt as a boy experiencing what I was experiencing. Now, after all of these years, it remains impossible to put into words my reverence of my master. Other artists merely idled with lines and color; only my master created with the flesh and bone of the mortal-world.
I was upon the threshold, neither demon nor human, altogether a new and different amalgam. And I was eager to be along my way through the gates Naraku’s art opened. Never have I felt as alive as when I sculpted the material with my master guiding my hands.
Throughout those early, impressionable years it was the practice that preserved my identity yet it warped me. I knew it, yes, I knew it – that was the subtlety of my master’s genius – as a fly to a spider so was Kohaku to Naraku. The play was designed so that with each and every new event I corrupted myself. And it possessed an important symmetry: an animal must be tormented to become a sculpture, so, a man must be scarred to become a god. And scarred in ways deeper and more beautiful than any line that marred the flesh.
My work, my art, was transforming me as it transformed the beasts.
Were I to have followed Kagura instead of Naraku, what would have become of me? Would I have been normal, by human standards, would I have been disturbed nevertheless? I like to think I would have been as I am. Truthfully, I could not have been normal, I was not meant to be normal. Only my demeanor remains to be considered as it would have been governed by the nature and depth of my scars. Both used me as a matter of habit but as far the ends for objectifying me were concerned, my purpose to Naraku was clearer than my use to Kagura.
Kagura.
I never told Kagura about the activity inside the chamber but I suspected she knew. She saw fragments of its design through the traps I set and the samples I collected. Doubtless she drew conclusions about eerie and occult rituals from the howls that echoed about the castle and the blood and flesh that stained my clothes every now and then.
I did not know what she knew but I did know it took very little effort for fear to be revealed. Something akin to terror – like shudders of horror – befell her otherwise icy demeanor whenever I examined the creatures of the forest. It started as accident and finished as parody – startling her, you see, became like a pastime – and the root of it was simple enough: as my artistry blossomed in my mind I sketched new and radical shapes that I was fond to trace about the contours of those animals not too scared of me to approach.
When the last of my milk-teeth fell, I was weaned off of the breast but contact of that quiet and intimate kind was not forbidden. When we were alone, in the castle or in the field, whenever I urged she allowed me loosen her kimono and expose her breast. I suckled her nipples – although her flesh was dry of milk – more often than not, though, I examined her body rapt by curiosity and arousal.
She would have killed anyone who dared abuse her, let alone expose and grope her, and she would have killed me, too, if I were not useful. Still, it never annoyed her, it never visibly-upset her when I played with her. She was amazingly tolerant and, even, encouraging of my behavior.
Just like Naraku fed off of my impulses, Kagura nurtured into maturity all of my base and carnal instincts. She fostered the connections between her body and my pleasure because she wanted me clinging onto her – needing her – for that intimate tenderness and understanding. She thought that a boy could be made to want a woman that way if it offered a substitute of friendship and a promise of solace and protection from a strange demonic existence full of enemies. It was the plan designed to whet my appetite for more and lead me into world I did not imagine existed where, of course, I got what I wanted and she got what she wanted.
Night in the castle, in the time of the month when Naraku would be gone, Kagura and I secluded ourselves within the bedroom. I do not remember what I said or what I did, exactly, only that suddenly I freed her breasts. I cupped them, feeling their warmth and weighing their mass with my hands. We were always very silent when I played with her but that night – as it was often every night – I stuttered about how beautiful and perfect they were, like artwork.
She did not as much as smile though I thought I pleased her.
I traced about her nipples. First I followed the shapes of their forms randomly switching the swirling of my fingers. Then I arched outward along their natural, bulging contours from the tips to the sides of her breasts. Then I noticed variations of textures that I connected as if it were the outline of a picture.
At once, unexpectedly, she clasped my hands and flung my grip away. She refastened her kimono and sat stern, upright. Again that horror. That terror. Where did it come from?
As quickly as she startled she recomposed herself, adjusting her posture and her position. Still upon the floor, she spread her legs until her kimono could not withstand the action. She drew me into the space that had been her lap, between her legs, and motioned me to kneel to squat face to face with her.
“His is an art of death, boy, don’t you understand that? Can’t you see that?”
She clung onto me so tight, so close, I poked into her belly with the peak of my stiffness which was encouraged to be displayed. Sensing my hardness, she reached it and tugged it but that did not hurt. I was used to the rough and abusive manipulations. She exposed my sac and I reacted with a start, not at the intrusion but at the harsh, cold air my skin felt.
She played with me but without the visceral fascination and curiosity I felt when I played with her. She knew everything about my body, everything about the way I worked and reacted, so much so that at times it seemed to be she was bored. That time there was a difference – there was a purpose – that revealed itself through the assertiveness of her actions.
I watched her examine the tip of my shaft. She massaged it as much as I massaged her nipples. She held my skin tight at its base and I replied by throbbing. The bobbing of my erection became ever more pronounced the longer and firmer she clutched its base. She placed my tip onto her lips and suckled it into her mouth. The feeling was new and produced sensations I did not experience before. And, again by reflex, I thrashed back my head and gasped, overwhelmed by a rush of pleasure and excitement. She continued to suckle, drawing more and more of my length into her mouth. I shuddered and grasped her kimono – I begged, almost tearing, wanting her to stop for my tip, now fully firm and engorged, became overly-sensitive and painful to be touched.
“Remember that, boy.” Kagura raised herself above me. “This is the power to be a god.”
She pressed herself upon me and clutched my erection, maneuvering it into her kimono, guiding it through the fabric of her clothes. Suddenly there was warmth – my skin was against her skin – suddenly, at my tip, I felt the sharp, prickly sting of hair and a new and mysterious wetness envelope my shaft. She thrust down, I stroked up. She freed my shaft from her hold but I remained where I was and I realized that I was within her body.
We continued our jerky, up and down motion. I gasped and shuddered but I did not resist. She pushed me and we fell backward upon the tatami, I on the bottom and she on the top. She urged me to keep grinding and thrusting – though her tone did not waver from its icy, dispassionate character all the while I breathed heavily and could only nod or shake an answer. Sensing my own, particular unfamiliarity, she helped by stroking her body up and down against my shaft.
Soon it was out of my control – if, indeed, it was ever – and the pace quickened into a frenzy that I struggled to maintain. I became afraid when the sensation of urine oozing out of my tip filled my shaft. I stopped – it did not abate her grinding and thrusting, it spurned her onward. I was crying saying I could be releasing water into her; she wanted it, she exclaimed, she needed it.
I bit my lip and shut my eyes, tears streamed down my cheeks as I prepared myself for the worst, possible outcome. A moment passed when I could not control the action of my body, I gasped and shook as if lightning streaked down my spine, and I felt my tip spurt something into Kagura.
She stroked while I softened. I tried to move, I tried to get up, but I was pinned and held tight against the mattress. She stopped when she noticed the pain across my face. I felt wetness rushing against my genitals and I winced, apologizing, again and again, for urinating insider her body. She laughed and arose, leaving me upon the bed, naked, like a used and battered rag-doll.
“I made you a man, Kohaku,” she said.
As I realized days later it was my semen that I ejaculated into her body. Until that night I did not produce it, I did not imagine it to be a possible function among humans or demons, though I knew and watched animals mate. So it was mysterious and frightening the first time but it soon became like any other aspect of my body that she played with when it suited her.
I was uneasy about something, though, and it stayed with me, stabbing into me like guilt whenever Naraku and I were together, for my seed was within Kagura, and it felt as if it were a deep and fundamental betrayal of my master.
I was twelve when the demoness took my virginity.
Through the course of what could have been a year, we repeated the act, mating wherever and whenever the opportunity materialized. I said mating and you understand, of course, by that I do not mean it was love. It was the act of animals and too mechanical to be love. Rather it became like a chore – a habit – that more and more resembled the character of rape as the excitement of the forbidden ebbed into cold and bitter dread.
From the first time to the last time, I did not divulge or suggest to Naraku the nature of the activities Kagura engaged in. Such as it was I found myself to be divided, torn between mind and body. I was strong enough to endure Naraku’s training yet I was too weak to resist Kagura’s urging. And as I was split, and as I was determined to be stronger than weaker, I innocently – inadvertently – let certain, unambiguous signs slip.
Yes, again, I chose sides. And, again, I – I – I was afraid.
The shame that I was weak. The guilt that I was human. I feared for my future and my safety, interlocked as they were within that world, as the long-term consequence of each and every performance was jeopardizing what I struggled to gain through the years: that place beside Naraku. What I would have done to reverse the disaster? To profess my love for my master? What I would have sacrificed!
I examined the genitals of the animals I sculpted. Among the males, I recognized structures and functions equivalent of my own body. With the females, I investigated the secret, hidden organs I understood corresponded to Kagura’s. In general, however, the sexes remained eerie and mysterious so, naturally, I asked Naraku.
He answered by inducing a pair of artwork to mate. I gasped; I was, visibly, uneasy at the sight of what used to be dogs, facing while thrusting into each other’s reworked and human-like bodies. The act was quite uncannily familiar.
The display was typical of my master and I should have remembered that when I asked but either I forgot or I suppressed the knowledge. Thus, answering by showing, he proved two major points. First, and obvious, the correspondence of the male and female genitals, how it lead to the physical act of mating and how it lead, invariably, to the method of mortal reproduction. Second, and subtle, that the art was superior to Nature not only in form but in creation for it became clearer to me now more than before how abhorrent, how unclean, was Nature’s work compared with Naraku’s art.
It was where babies came from, he said, at length, more mockingly than seriously. I echoed that selfsame monkish tone when I asked if my seed made babies too. For the first time, ever, he paused at the wake of a question. He clutched my shoulders and I dropped the subject.
The effect of my inquiry was instant and radical. From that day I marked a change in Naraku’s demeanor with respect to Kagura. Smoldering and consuming paranoia raged within my master. He became incessantly watchful and unduly interested about all of the aspects of her day-to-day life. Since she and I mated, she remained fixed with her best behavior and perhaps the rouse proved to be too perfect, too convenient, and defied believability. Perhaps it was I who destroyed the image of a faithful and dutiful servant she toiled to project.
Aspects of my past remain unclear and confused.
I do remember that eventually she and I stopped the ritual of reproduction and resumed the habit of massaging. Except, unlike the way it had been, I could not touch her. I could not expose her. She did not reveal an inch of flesh below the neck, her clothes being tighter and securer than ever. I did not object and I was not disappointed. It was almost like relief – as if it would be normal again between us – and I attributed the change to my master’s vigilance.
I knew it then as I know it now – across time and space Naraku would be there to protect me.
Indeed I was grateful for the change.
One night I waited for Kagura to return to finish what we started. It must have been the midnight hour when I grew too frustrated with the situation to bear it any longer. I was upon the verge of relieving myself when I was struck by the urge to crawl out of the bedroom and into the hallway. I cannot describe the strangeness of the impulse for it was not driven by the world of the material – like the sound – rather I was pulled by something else. Something outside of the realm of the conscious. Yet it was as real as anything that could be sensed.
Again, as if echoed anew through the span of the years, the fortress was as quiet as a tomb. And, again, as if ignorant of the interior of the castle, I explored about the recesses of the corridors. Part of me felt like I was chased by unspeakable horror; part of me knew I was chasing the very terror into its abode. I stumbled upon the chamber, I gazed at the doorway; I wondered, I dreaded. It was not a time when Naraku and I were set to meet, it should have been empty but I knew it would not be and there as I expected behind the gates I was met by the spider.
It was a smile, not words and not gestures, that invited me into the chamber.
I entered and Naraku evaporated, as it were, into shadow. Vanishing into darkness the absence of his figure revealed Kagura, bloody and beaten, chained like a prisoner against the wall. I ambled toward the demoness, confident of my superiority over her and her powers because I was within my kingdom. I noted her condition, her torn kimono and exposed torso. The bulk of her proportions were scared and disfigured.
I was confused. Lost amidst a kind of perceptual-haze. And the disorientation persisted until it occurred to me that like the animals in the cages she had been cut and stitched. It was that she had not been transformed that confused me.
Why is she not transformed I asked though it seemed the words came out in random, nonsense syllables. What would be of Kagura?
I am certain – though I cannot be sure – that he replied it would not be important.
Naraku said that day I began a student and ended a master. I was tasked with the completion of a project entirely and uniquely my own. Start to finish I would be working by myself; I would not be receiving any help from any one. As he said that through his characteristic, noble inflection, he approached, walking from the abyss of the chamber to the slab at its center, holding within his hands a deep, metal basin. The object – which I took to be my project – was covered by the silk: the cloak was rounded along the middle and tucked-in along the edges of the vat. The contours alone did not suggest the contents but the rhythmic – and living – movements of it contents threatened to slip away the cloth and reveal itself.
He set the basin upon the slab and I, trustingly, removed the silk.
I admit the majority of the events are lost. I do not recall what it was that I had been presented with under that cloak, raw and incomplete. I do not recall what, exactly, I did with the material that earned me my distinction. All that was left of my passage from student to artisan – all that was left within my memory – were masses of flesh, smooth and hairless; scared and crushed portions of abdomens; tiny soft bones, like limbs, stitched onto a ribcage; and a misshapen, almost empty, head. A head that were it not for a lack of lower jaw could have resembled a human head. No. A demon head. No. Can I be sure? Can I be sure? It could have been a mix between the two. With those ears and those eyes and that face it could have been, could it have been –
“There’s a demon inside you, Kohaku.”
I remember those words, I remember those words, I remember those words like I remember my name or my voice or my hands. The sentence was branded into my soul forever, eternally, with its sounding I became Kohaku. Instantly the pleasures of the flesh symbolized by Kagura vanished as if like smoke and Nature did not matter anymore.
Alas, I did not have long to contemplate the life of my creation. As I examined it – with my hands for my eyes could not be forced to look upon it – the object died. It did not scream – I expected a scream and it did not scream –
Naraku clutched my shoulder and laughed. We were equal and the finer, lesser details did not matter and could not take away from my triumph. I was assured I succeeded only the creation failed.
It was too weak to sustain the perfection of my vision, he explained.
Truer words there never were before or since. My vision was greater than what the world allows itself to be. And it would not be the last time life crumbled under the pressure of my genius.
END OF CHAPTER
Submit a Reivew