Work Text:
Zero's life has always been something he'd found quite... Wrong. Erratic, even.
He gets told otherwise — often, and with insistence. Your work is to be praised, he's told. Those feelings — those dreams — will make sense, he's told. You will find a way out — with us, he's told.
All the swordsman can think to say back is...
'That would be quite nice.'
But things are not very nice the way they are. The scent of blood never leaves him, and it only gets stronger as he feels the familiar sting of a needle and the suspension of time that's bound to follow.
In that still moment, nothing can ring out — not a cry of pleasure, not a plea for help. And when Zero finds his voice again, he knows he must not use it — he must take his assignment and leave.
As soon as the wooden door closes behind the man, he breathes a small sigh of relief.
He's had quite enough of the unpleasant mistress that is silence.
A click of a faded play button — and the world begins to make sense once more. Each beat of the song that drowns out Zero's very heart transforms into the actions he takes next — step, step, step, until he's out the office — and in a quiet, undisturbed place. The cold, silver weight of a lighter in his hand. The words in the dossier pulsing, blurring to that same beat.
A click of the lighter — sparks rising to the sky. Another — and with a swift movement of his hand, all traces are concealed.
Right on cue, as the song's fading out.
It's quite a short fade-out, but it feels infinite. Lost in the silence, Zero hopes the next track will be good.
Then again, does it really matter, when anything is better than dry voices of reporters or sweet lies of psychiatry?
And even those are better than innocents' last cries, aren't they?
…………
The new track is faster, more hurried, almost as if it's encouraging Zero to pick up the pace himself. Work never tends to get itself done, he thinks, as he kicks the first door of the sprawling building open.
It yields to him, as all things do, in time. But before that, the swordsman has to conquer this stage by stopping the whole audience dead in their tracks.
He has to figure out the rhythm.
Kick, strike, jump- into a bullet.
Kick, strike, dodge, strike, dodge again- onto a stray blade.
Kick, strike, stri- why'd he do that twice? Now everything is off!
With each new loop — or rather, interruption of the song, — a piece of Zero's calm temper evaporates. As death begins to come for him faster and faster, he forces himself to linger — to pull himself together, in that unknowable space where he's dead yet alive.
Where he can feel nothing but his own heart, struggling to catch up to the song in his ears.
Work never tends to get itself done.
When next he opens his eyes, that door is waiting for him, like a friend. Like a puppy that wants to be kicked.
And Zero's all too happy — despite how exhausted he is — to oblige.
Eventually, the song reaches his favorite part, somewhere around the middle, and somehow, everything just slots itself in place from there. The swordsman doesn't need to think, or breathe, or slow, as he deals with the last of the gunmen and turrets, unbothered.
Zero has always known — that rhythm is the only thing he can trust to guide him. To make things work.
…………
With a sigh of disappointment gone unheard, Zero clicks the button that once again invites silence to his world. It doesn't last long, however, as his intercom begins to irritatingly buzz beneath his robes.
This click is much less satisfying.
Your work is to be praised, he's told.
They both pretend this isn't something they have heard a thousand times. 'Go home and rest' — a well-known mockery.
But home is home, and go there, he will.