I

Standing Water

(https://youtu.be/oDO4heinPQw) Ashleigh's boots fell heavily against the wet asphalt. Her hands were shoved tightly into her jacket pockets, bulging them out in front of her in a way that was clearly very forced and unnatural. She walked aimlessly down the tight streets of Kyoto, her hood pulled up and her head hanging low. She stared at the ground, her poor posture hiding a terribly nervous expression that clearly said one thing.

"What the hell am I doing...?!"

A fair question. What the hell was she doing? She was at least a half hour west of home by train in an unfamiliar part of town on a Saturday night. Something had posessed her - some vague, ethereal form of dissatisfaction. It had been eating away at her for some time now, and she was unable to put her finger on what this feeling was, or discern it's cause. She fell on the notion of change as a potential remedy to her dilemma, and decided that she would do something spontaneous... and that was kind of it. She snuck out through her bedroom window after she believed the others in her household were asleep, and began to just... wander. Hoping that at any moment, she would find something that would ease her troubled mind - something to do, or at least something that would inspire her to do more than she was currently doing. She had not been so lucky.

At this point in the year, she'd developed a solid daily rhythm. Wake up, endure Mio during breakfast, go to school, do school stuff, eat lunch (+study with Imai or making up some other excuse to hang out with him), come home, endure Mio again, train for an hour or so in the backyard, come back inside to shower, eat dinner and study, have a couple hours of free time to game or do whatever. For a girl her age, this wasn't the worst routine in the world. But it just felt... wrong. Not wrong as in incorrect, but as in... bad. Uncomfortable. Blegh. And Ashleigh was no stranger to negative feelings! Quite the opposite, actually. An expert in her field if ever there was one. It's part of what made the whole damn thing so troubling - the fact that she couldn't pin down what she was feeling or why. It was enough to push her to this half-baked, irrational, and truthfully, dangerous decision.

Everyone had heard about what Chris had gone through by now. She'd heard the rumors about what got Hiro held back. She was pretty sure she'd heard about something similar happening to Jugo earlier in the year. It was clear to her that the streets of Kyoto, especially after dark, was not the place to fuck around. And yet here she was, on the verge of finding out.

Ashleigh took a moment to rest against the wall of a nearby storefront, pulling out her phone to check the time. 23:41. She quickly unlocks her phone and begins to rapidly and indecisively flip through her apps. She opens up a game, maybe that'll calm her down - no way, she's far too anxious to play anything right now. She opens up the internet browser to check one of her favorite threads - nope, what the hell does she need to look at that for? She opens up her messenger for a moment and wonders if she should text anyone - maybe Yui? Would Yui show up if she texted her right now? Maybe. Probably. But did she want to burden her like that? No. No, she did not. And she definitely did NOT want to bother Imai with something that could only be described as purely stupid and irresponsible behavior. Somehow, she didn't feel like that would score her any points with him. And what would contacting either of them do for her, anyway? It's doubtful that either of them would have any insight into solving a problem that Ashleigh couldn't even put into words.

She sighs, dropping her arms to her sides in defeat.

"Okay, this experiment has gone on long enough... Time to pack it in."

She pulls her phone back up to her face and quickly begins typing her address into her preferred navigation app. So focused she is on what she's doing, that she doesn't notice the hooded figure stealthily approaching from her right. One moment, she's looking at the route the app has planned for her. The next, her phone is gone. She panics and looks up, to see a thief running down the street with it. "H-Hey!" she yells, her voice wavering. "That's..." she breaks into a sprint after the thief, "that's my phone!!"

The man is surprisingly quick, and his footsteps are unusually loud, but Ashleigh is determined and catching up. He's not exactly making it difficult, running down the cramped little street in a straight line. He doesn't seem like a completely inexperienced criminal, but it seems like he's certainly used to picking on targets that he's pegged as being slouches.

"Today, he's wrong!"

As Ashleigh continues closing the gap, she produces her whip and flails it at the thief, wrapping it around his right leg and pulling hard. He looses his balance as his leg is pulled out from under him, and tumbles in the street. Ashleigh stumbles for a moment as well, attempting to control her end of the whip through the man's violent movements as he tumbles end-over-end. She begins to decelerate, anticipating that he will give up after the fall. She is wrong to expect this. Suddenly, the man shoots back up and begins to sprint away once more - this time, dragging an unexpecting Ashleigh behind him. He looks back at her, and she is caught off-guard by an ugly equine visage. The thief flashes a smug, shit-eating horse grin at Ashleigh as she attempts to pick up speed again and match his pace once more. Unfortunately, acceleration is the thief's strong suit. Ashleigh is unable to maintain her grip on her weapon as the man starts bolting away, and she falls hard on the wet pavement as the whip is yanked out of her hands. She lays there for a moment, her clothes now wet and her already barely-existent self-esteem in pieces as she listens to the sound of her whip's handle clattering against the street, fading into the distance.

"Well, that was the logical conclusion to this adventure. Losing both your whip and your phone to some thief... horse... freak. What the fuck were you thinking? God damnit, why are you so fucking stupid? Why couldn't you have just stayed home? You could have tried out a new game tonight, picked up a new hobby or something, that would have been 'change' - not whatever the hell this was supposed to be! What are you going to tell Dad? Sorry Dad, but not only did you raise a total psycho, you also raised a completely fucking worthless idiot!"

Her thoughts stop just before they fall more towards Mio... Holy hell, did she not want to think about what Mio was going to say about this. How Mio would use this information to torment her. A ball of impotent rage and self pity began to form in the pit of her stomach at the idea of the thought. She could feel all the muscles in her body tightening painfully with the shame and regret of her own stupidity, and she had to focus every remaining ounce of her will on not breaking down in the middle of the street. Not like there were many people around to notice - what more did she have to lose, really? Whatever image the few strangers out at this time held of her? The dam is threatening to burst, when Ashleigh is snapped out of her thoughts by something.

(https://youtu.be/cfG6YpYF02k)

The sound of heavy footsteps making their way toward her, with a familiar sound accompanying them. She looks up to see a hulking, blue mass of a man walking towards her. He wears a strangely casual outfit that does not match his incredibly imposing figure and piercing red eyes. In one hand, he holds that damn thief, her whip still hanging from his leg, and the handle still dragging against the ground. In his other, he holds a bowl of ramen that looks comically tiny in his enormous hand.

The horse man didn't look so smug anymore - not with a giant blue hand tightly gripping his throat, his eyes nearly bulging out of his skull, his limbs uselessly flailing against his captor... the sight was downright comedic to Ashleigh. Somewhat cathartic, even, to see the little shit squirming like a worm against this demon of an individual.

The giant blue man stops before Ashleigh. He eyes her suspiciously for a moment, as if sizing her up. He begins to speak in a thick eastern european accent, his voice deep and rough. Every word that escapes his lips seems chosen with great deliberation, despite the... less-than-perfect results.

"Ah. Drekus remember you."

Ashleigh clears her throat. "Me? U-Uhm... have w-we met?"

"Yes. Er... No. Drekus does not meet you. Forget this, is not important. Here," Drekus says, holding the thief's body towards Ashleigh, "remove toy from him."

Ashleigh dusts herself off as she begins to stand. She unwinds her whip from the thief's leg, and presses the button to retract it back into the handle. Once it's all back in, she returns it to it's rightful place, clipped to one of her rightmost belt loops.

"Is disappointing to see you do not get stronger since last time. Still weak, like baby deer. You have not eaten unruly stump-child yet?"

Ashleigh can tell that this guy is... possibly not 'all there'. He just said they'd never met, and now he's talking about how she hasn't grown any stronger since 'last time'? Comparing her to a baby deer was pretty unnecessary. And what the hell could he possibly mean by that stump-child comment? She's both visibly confused and slightly hurt by his comments.

"...Eh, nevermind. Drekus come to thank you. Stupid horse man run up and down street all night, annoys Drekus with hideous horse laughter. Drekus cannot catch him. Maybe if you do not show up to slow him down, Drekus never catch him."

Well, that is pretty comforting to hear. Ashleigh had actually done something sort of right for once. Drekus roughly reaches into the horse man's pockets to remove Ashleigh's phone, which he gently hands back to her. It's got a huge crack in the screen now, but she's just grateful to have it back. Probably happened when she tripped him. She checks to make sure the screen still works before putting it back into her pocket.

"Drekus apologize if little rectangle is damaged. Now..." Drekus hands Ashleigh his bowl of ramen, "Drekus crush stupid horse. He does not bother us anymore."

Ashleigh's eyes widen as both of Drekus' hands move to the horse man's skull. Without thinking, she interrupts. "W-Woah, Drekus, that's, um...! Y-you really don't have to do that, Drekus! The, uh... we can just call the police instead!"

Drekus looks at Ashleigh with some measure of confusion. Does she believe that this is a hassle for Drekus? Killing this horse man? "No, really. Is no big deal for Drekus. Promise. Now..." he begins to squeeze. The horse man's eyes begin to bulge painfully out of their sockets, and his flailing becomes more frantic and desperate.

"DREKUS!!!" Ashleigh practically yelps, shrieking in a shrill and incredibly abrasive manner completely uncharacteristic of herself. She's really, really not trying to see this horse guy's head get popped like a grape tonight.

Drekus stops. He completely understands now - Ashleigh feels like she's not being considered, even though she assisted in the horse man's capture. She should have a say in what happens to him. "Ah. Drekus get it now. What do you wish happens for him?"

Ashleigh breathes deeply, attempting to compose herself for a moment. "We should... I don't know, restrain him? A-And then, just leave him for the authorities to collect! There's no need for... that..." her voice softens as her temporarily built composure wears off. Drekus nods thoughtfully. "Yes. This is acceptable solution. Drekus understand perfectly. Very well."

Ashleigh breathes a sigh of relief. Thank god that was over. Now she could focus on - oh god. Oh god. WHAT IS-

Drekus flips the horse man over so that he is now face-to-face with his spindly horse legs. Drekus carefully grabs the left leg by the knee and bends it towards himself at a ninety-degree angle. The horse man, with his head now free, begins to cry out in pure horror as his bones snap and crunch under Drekus' monstrous, vice-like grip. He continues the act, slowly twisting and spinning the limb in unnatural directions, loosening it until he can easily yank the limb apart at the joint in one quick tug. He tosses the horse man carelessly against a wall, still holding onto the severed horse limb in his other. Ashleigh was frozen in complete terror; what the fuck. What the fuck did she just watch? WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?! She began trembling violently, the ramen bowl's contents sloshing around in her hands as she attempts to process what she just had the misfortune of witnessing. Her stomach twists and turns itself into sickening knots as she watches the horse man desperately crawling away, screaming pitifully and leaving a dark red trail of fluid in his wake. The few people on the street begin to panic and run in all different directions away from Drekus as they notice what's going on. Ashleigh is utterly and completely frozen, and barely reacts when Drekus takes his ramen bowl back. Her newly freed hands slowly move to cover her mouth, anticipating that her stomach will evacuate it's contents at any moment now.

"He does not get far after this. Maybe police grab him. Maybe ambulance get there first." Drekus lets out a hearty, satisfied chuckle and looks to Ashleigh. "Well, is time we leave. Things get bad if authorities find Drekus. Is maybe bad if authorities find you also, yes?"

Ashleigh says nothing, still completely in shock.

"This silence say everything. Very well, Drekus knows place. You follow Drekus. Come," Drekus says. He unceremoniously tosses the horse leg up onto a nearby rooftop, and then kneels down to remove a manhole cover. "You go first. Drekus put lid back on. Hurry."

Ashleigh looks into the sewer's opening, and is still unable to bring herself to do anything - she can't run, she can't speak, she can't-

"MOVE, little girl! Why you waste time?! Drekus do not have all night!" Drekus booms angrily. It's all the encouragement Ashleigh needs to snap out of her paralysis and reluctantly climb down into the unknown.