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Emil Sinclair was dead.
That, Ryōshū idly mused, wasn't the most unusual thing. Of the twelve sinners, she figured he was tied with Yi Sang for having the least experience in violence — and, from what she saw, that wing feather was cautious almost to the degree of paralysis, only using that knife of his when his inscrutable mind eliminated any uncertainty from his desired outcome. Sinclair held neither the still temperament nor the eidetic intelligence for such deliberation; thus, when he did do something other than passively hide behind his halberd, it was often rash, hastily thought out, and — most damningly of all — uncertain.
Relying on instinct over calculation was all well and good, Ryōshū herself could certainly attest to that, but the battlefield was no place for uncertainty. Each and every action had to be unfaltering; any moment of doubt or hesitation would be capitalised upon and punished. Sinclair had those moments in spades, lending him the unfortunate title of sinner most often killed in action.
'Hesitation is defeat', went the common wisdom. Sinclair certainly proved that to a tee.
Granted, he was still capable, and more or less kept up with the team fine. Sinclair could generally be counted on to at least hold his own and make a few corpses, even if he'd gag at the sight afterwards. Ryōshū just thought he was a little too mild and timid and, again, uncertain in everything he does.
Dante must've thought so too, for in the company's latest foray into the finger-molested backstreets, he made the executive decision to lump him with the two most violent sinners on the team. Sinclair was a man who took from his environment, went the clock's reasoning, so he hoped that being with the likes of herself and Heathcliff would help steel his nerves and steady his hand.
Which brought Ryōshū to the current… curiosity, let's say, splayed out in front of her. It looked like Dante's plan worked a little too well.
Emil Sinclair was dead.
The sheer amount of corpses surrounding him was new.
Throats slashed open. Intestines spilled. Skulls cracked against the ground, against a wall, against the blunt end of a halberd. Clavicles severed. Stomachs run through. Quite the bloody mess it was, no less than a dozen would-be assassins laid out across the pavement. To an undiscerning eye, there wasn't anything to it; no more noteworthy than the fourteen-person mural she just finished, or the fifteen bodies piled up against the wall besides Heathcliff. Perhaps one might even call it underwhelming.
Ryōshū knew better. Corpses said much about the person who made them.
This most recent mural of hers, to take an example, was much more experimental than her usual fare; it lacked a central subject, for one, the eyes instead being drawn in a great many directions at once to wounds of all different shapes and hues. It evoked just the right blend of whimsy and flightiness, in her humble opinion, enough to reflect that incident three days ago when Don Quixote dragged her around a high-end workshop for the first time. Ryōshū's mind subsequently went rampant with inspiration from the exotic arsenal on display, so much so that she had to be restrained from buying out the entire shop and blowing the team's budget for the month, but that was neither here nor there. Perhaps she should name this piece after that workshop, to honour the original inspiration.
Or take Heathcliff. All of his corpses were unceremoniously dumped on the side of the street, no care whatsoever put into presentation as he quite literally tossed them aside as he would bags of rubbish. And the way they all perished? Their defining wounds, perhaps the foremost thing that sets one corpse apart from another? All the same old bruises, broken bones, and blunt force trauma to the head. It was bad enough that the sinners didn't seem to share Ryōshū's artistic sensibilities, but Heathcliff really was the worst offender; it's like he was trying his best to be as plain and boorish as possible.
And at first glance, Sinclair wasn't much better. If Heathcliff was the equivalent of only ever using one brush and pigment, then Sinclair took that paint and splattered it against the canvas without rhyme or reason. Ryōshū could at least appreciate the reds and crimsons painted all over, but art had to mean something, and these corpses were so torn apart and ruined that whatever grand message he was trying to carve into their bodies was rendered illegible by blood and viscera. It reminded her of a child's juvenile scribblings, which… well, she couldn't say the comparison wasn't apt.
Yet she nonetheless found her gaze transfixed. There was far too much red, yes; that was the point. The more she stared, the more she realised that no, this wasn't just a botched attempt at artistic expression. Writing it off as such would be to ignore the way those gashes ripped rather than sliced. The way their jaws were shattered to such an excessive degree as if to just get them to shut up above all else. The way Sinclair didn't even seem to target their vital organs and instead littered their bodies with painful, exsanguinating cuts.
Ryōshū was a tad too occupied during that little ambush to keep tabs on her fellow sinners, but the corpses said everything. Sinclair snapped. However it happened, he switched from his usual perpetually-anxious demeanour to seeing nothing but red, concerned only with causing as much pain to his assaulters as possible. Looking at his body, that's probably how he died: too caught up in his frenzy to notice his own wounds as they accumulated and worsened.
The sight before her was messy. It was senseless, it was needless, and it was raw — raw with strife, with disgust and hatred, with a white-hot fury long denied its outlet. It was rare — nay, improbable — to find that much unshackled passion in this drab city of greys and darker greys. Yes, this final product was unbelievably crude, but she could change that. She could help this fledgling bird out of his nest and guide his uncertain hand to create art, true art, dredged up from his beautifully ruined heart and splayed out for the world to—
'Oi.' Something blunt and metallic nudged her head. 'Snap out of it.'
Ryōshū clicked her tongue in annoyance. She was getting somewhere with that train of thought, she really was. 'Snap out of what, Heathcliff? Can I not have a moment to enjoy the scenery?'
Heathcliff scoffed. 'Not when the scenery you're gawking at is that of our dead coworker. We have to drag him all the way back to the bus, y'know.'
'Oh, I know.' Ryōshū's gaze drifted back to the corpses.
'You know.' Heathcliff tapped his foot, an ever-impatient glint in his eyes. 'So let's get going already. Clock-face gets even more impatient than I do.'
Ryōshū gave a derisive chuckle. 'Dante can wait. I'm not done soaking in the sights just yet.'
Back when they first met, that comment would've earned her a bat to the face and a scuffle would break out then and there. Now, though, he just shot her a tired glare and moved to retrieve Sinclair's corpse. She wagered that Heathcliff's built up a tolerance for her 'artsy bullshit', as he'd colourfully put it — just like she's built up a tolerance for his one-note boorishness. Ryōshū wondered if this was what friendship looked like.
Perhaps it was this terse camaraderie that compelled her to fill the dead air while Heathcliff made a path across the carpet of corpses.
'Say, what do you think?'
Heathcliff didn't bother looking back as he levelled a flat reply. ''Bout what?'
'Our boy Sinclair's made quite the mess, hasn't he?'
'The hell do you mean, "our boy"?' Sinclair's mangled corpse was retrieved and unceremoniously thrown over Heathcliff's shoulder in a fireman's carry. 'Makin' it sound like you're his mother or something.'
Ryōshū carried on, carefully ignoring that comment and the memories it threatened to dredge up. 'Surely you find this sight a little strange coming from Sinclair of all people. Even you don't normally leave bodies this ruined.'
It was then that Heathcliff stopped and took a cursory look around. His brow creased. 'Kid's got some anger issues.'
'So you noticed.' Ryōshū's look of surprise was equal parts exaggerated and genuine. 'Takes one to know one, I suppose.'
A sigh. 'Don't lump me in with this kid. I'm not unhinged as to cause this sorry display.'
That quirked her eyebrow. He dared to call this powerful, poignant sight a 'sorry display'? Ryōshū rose to her height as a strange possessiveness took hold of her heart. 'Sinclair poured out his heart for this, I hope you realise. How would he feel if his first ever work was met with your blunt words?'
'All the better if he stops. The team doesn't need another deranged maniac painting blood on walls.'
Heathcliff was already making his way back towards the bus. Ryōshū kept pace behind.
'For the millionth time, it's not just "painting blood on walls". There's a soul to every artwork, an emotion behind every blow. That work back there, the one you called a "sorry display"? That was filled to the brim with anger, unrefined and raw. For all its messiness, it had more potential than anything you've produced in your entire life.'
Heathcliff's tone grew a sharper edge. 'Would you quit it with your pompous artist talk? Anger is anger, end of story. Ain't nothing pretty about it, and there certainly ain't nothing pretty about going ballistic and making that mess back there.'
Now she was starting to get annoyed. Either this man was a buffoon who didn't know what he was talking about, or he was purposefully trying to rile her up. It was probably both, but that didn't stop her from responding with perhaps more emotion in her voice than she needed.
'Ugliness is the point! You don't honestly think art is meant to be all dolled up and pretty, do you? Or are you that much of a simpleton that this is where your tastes lie?'
'I'm saying that flying off your fuckin' handle because someone looked at you funny ain't something to be proud of!' Heathcliff matched her rising temper in spades. 'What about this don't you bloody understand?'
'What about this don't you understand? Ah, right, my mistake for thinking you of all people would be able to appreciate anything that isn't a sack of corpses.' Their voices were probably giving away their location to the entire neighbourhood, but Ryōshū couldn't care less at the moment. 'You're a lucky bastard, you know that? You've got all the anger in the world, seething, roiling beneath your skin, yet you've got no idea how to use it. '
'Oh, I know perfectly well how to use my anger. Hell, I can even tell you why I'm angry right now: it's because you saw the aftermath of a tantrum and you're insisting that it's art.' Heathcliff's voice may have dropped a few notches, but his glare held more fury than ever. 'This is what I mean. I'm not seeing red. I'm not flying into a rage screaming bloody murder like that blond kid. In fact, my mind's clearer than it's ever been right now. If you got off your high horse then maybe you'd see that anger is a force you bend to your will, not the other way around.'
Ryōshū remained undeterred and redoubled her gaze. 'And where has that gotten you? What has that stone-cold sterile approach done for your scars, your trauma, the phantoms that torment you in your dreams? Not much, I'd imagine.' Heathcliff looked like he burst a vein then and there, which she took as a good sign. 'Hatred is a river of blood and refuse, and it is meant to flow outwards. Sinclair let the river flow and stayed true to his heart, whereas all you've done is dam the river to drown yourself in the past.'
That seemed to settle it. Heathcliff whipped out his bat and brandished it at Ryōshū with a white-knuckle grip. 'You don't know a damn thing about the shit I've been through,' he growled.
'Oh, but I think I do.' She rested a hand on her katana and let the familiar thrill of battle light up her eyes. 'We're both human. We all bleed the same.'
It's been a while since they've come to blows, but both seemed to think this was far overdue. As Heathcliff prepared to charge and Ryōshū crouched into a stance, ready to draw her katana in the blink of an eye—
Thud.
The still-mutilated body of Sinclair fell from Heathcliff's shoulder and landed head-first between the two sinners, producing a sickening crack as his head snapped backwards.
Ryōshū blinked. She blinked again. Then she realised what they were supposed to be doing in the first place, and released her grip on her katana. Miraculously, Heathcliff followed suit, slinging his bat over his shoulder with a heavy sigh that sounded more exhausted than angry. He then reached down to pull Sinclair back over his shoulder, only to pause and stare at the corpse for a long while, an inscrutable expression on his face.
Finally, he spoke, his voice well-worn from their earlier spat. 'There's better ways for the kid to be angry than blind rage.'
Ryōshū chuckled. 'Better than trying to tame it. Let things come naturally, I say.'
'What, and let him snap again and again? Just for the sake of your "art"?'
Heathcliff's words caused her pause for perhaps the first time today. Was it for the sake of art? Well, yes — Sinclair's heart was practically spilling with pitch-black resentment, she'd be insane not to capitalise on that — but the more she stopped and thought, the more apparent it became that she had another stake in this boy.
Again, that feeling of possessiveness floated to the top of her heart. Not just possessiveness, either. Pride. Disappointment. Concern. Protectiveness. All emotions complementary to the one concept she thought she would never touch again, locked in the corner of her heart.
Ryōshū knew this feeling. She knew it like an old stitched-over scar. So she spoke.
'Not just for art.' She crouched down to Sinclair, brushing his bloodstained hair from his face with a tenderness that felt wrong of her to possess. 'For him.'
There was nothing more to be said, really. For all her macabre sensibilities, her scarred heart and her ash-smothered past, she saw the corpse of Emil Sinclair and she wanted to see it grow. She knew without a shadow of a doubt that the potential was there for his broken soul to flourish, for the tar deep in his chest to be dredged up so that he may stand on his own two legs, sure of himself, sure of his own heart. He just needed a guiding hand.
A hand that, once upon a time, might've belonged to a mother.
Heathcliff broke the thick silence. 'The hell's that supposed to mean?'
Perhaps it was due to her unusually hopeful mood, but Ryōshū laughed — not chuckled, laughed — at the way that man's bluntness always managed to utterly shatter her daydreams without fail. 'Of course you wouldn't get it, Heathcliff. Ever the boorish oaf, aren't you.'
Heathcliff surrendered a rare snicker as he hoisted up Sinclair's corpse once again. 'And you're the most deranged person I've ever met.'
And the two sinners carried the corpse of their coworker back to the Mephistopheles without further incident. Conversation between them was scarce and terse for the trip back, but Ryōshū couldn't care less. Her mind was elsewhere.
Emil Sinclair was dead.
Yet in her eyes, his soul never shined brighter.