Interesting - KenHina
Warnings: Hints at violence and demons eating humans. Not explicit, but it’s there.
“If you ever stop being interesting, I’ll eat you.”
Demon Kenma befriends his meal. Excerpt drabble.
Kenma could still remember the smell of dew and dirt on Shouyou those years ago. The way he’d leaned down so Shouyou could feel all two inches of the difference in height between them, and see the sharpened points of his teeth. He’d kept his hands firmly in his pockets, afraid of what his claws might do. He’d looked Shouyou in the eyes, and said, “if you ever stop being interesting, I’ll eat you.”
And Shouyou had smiled. Under the twilight and clearly at a demon’s mercy, Shouyou’s eyes had blazed, making Kenma wonder who exactly between the two of them was actually the demon.
Shouyou had agreed, though. He’d keep being interesting so Kenma would always want to hang out.
Hang out was a loose term. They spent every meeting there after nearly killing each other. Some days, it was by the skin of his teeth that Shouyou hadn’t had his neck snapped. He was sloppy and untrained, but made up for it with sheer enthusiasm and reflex. He was sloppy, but he could remain unpredictable. Kenma could read him well enough for a few times before he’d end up baffled again, working his brain for another go around to beat Shouyou. It ended how it always began, with Shouyou waving at Kenma and dropping a meat bun in his hands.
Kenma supposed it was a decent enough replacement. He could quietly imagine it was Shouyou’s flesh he was tearing through, digging into the core to try and find what kept Kenma coming back.
That had been years ago. A blink of the eye for Kenma, but time well spent for Shouyou. He was taller, with less baby fat, and a sure and steady stride that made Kenma’s tails swish with anticipation. Kenma ran a tongue along one fang.
As much as he complained about the slow passage of time, and the fleetingly short lives of humans, he felt caught in a crosshairs with Shouyou. What had felt like a millenia between them was dawning too quickly. The sixteen year old boy he’d met when he’d come to snatch him from the lonely mountain roads looking for a meal, had turned into a man who’d sliced three of his fingers off.
He clutched his hand to his chest. His eyes wide and calculating as Shouyou flicked away the blood from his blade. He grinned, boyish as always at Kenma.
“How was that?”
He would find it condescending if he didn’t know Shouyou all these years. The same foolish boy who’d volunteered his name to a demon. The same foolish boy who, outside of them trying to kill each other, sat with Kenma at the old decaying shrine he called home, and talked his ear off until the night threatened to break through the trees. The man who’d honed his reflexes and skills, his body remembering each battle until he could match Kenma blow for blow. Foolish, interesting Shouyou.
“Good,” Kenma in-toned. “You actually know how to swing it now.”
Shouyou huffed. “I’ve been practicing. I’ve managed to get Kageyama to shoot arrows at me so I could prepare for your sneak attacks.”
“If he’d managed to accidentally kill you like that, Shouyou, I wouldn’t be very happy,” Kenma teased, amazed he still had such a soft spot for the man after he’d nearly taken his head off.
“Good thing only you can do that then, huh?”
If you can went unsaid. Kenma smiled with all his teeth. “Yeah. Good thing.”
Kenma haphazardly wrapped his hand, staring intently where the bone had been cut through cleanly. Any closer and there’d be a scar on his neck. He couldn’t help the tingle along his back. The urge to curve and watch until he could strike to win. His gaze flickered to the way Shouyou dug his heel into the dirt, changing his stance. They came together again, intent on besting the other.
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AN: for the life of me I can’t write this fic no matter how i try to tackle it. So I just made a tiny mini thing. And even this isn’t fully up to snuff for me. It’s a play on what Kenma actually says to Shouyou in the manga, but I thought it would be fun if Kenma said something similar but in a different context.
Basically: despite them being rivals/enemies, they still hang out like friends. Kenma is like “this is a human that would be great to eat” but also “if i eat this human, i won’t have anything to do anymore”.
Idk if it’s not obvious but i don’t condone eating people lmao.
