Title: A Progidal Man
Involves: Xellos, Gourry, Lina, and miserable, gut-wrenching envy.
Rating: worksafe
Genre: gen
Type: Fanfic (old, revised)
Notes: I'm having a case of the superstitions. This comm and an out-fandom fic I want to see updated both posted for the last time on the same day. I seem to think that if I post here, she'll post there. Bets, anyone? Well, whatever. It's about time for a post anyway, right? If you feed them, they will DaR? Hey, worth a shot. ^,^

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He makes me sick. They all do, at times, in their own ways; it’s a peculiarity of humans. They're our manna, and our hemlock. Just to be near them is heaven and hell.

Stop. Reverse that. Thank you.

How could we not be their enemies, when we're diametrically opposed? How can they help but hate us, when we gladly lick the venom from their souls? How can we help but hate them, when they strain themselves to replace the bliss they can giving us with the wrenching twists of nausea they call happiness?

At least I have nice table manners. And do they appreciate it? Do they even bother to notice how easy I make it for them, how I leave them untouched, how much freedom I leave them to joke around and enjoy themselves, the strain I submit myself to in order to eat slowly and not make barren my hunting grounds?

The sorceress might. Or maybe she suffers my presence because she knows there’s no getting rid of me. She is bright, in her own selfish little ways. But as for the others? Of course not. A demon is a demon, after all. Particularly to my little pebbly friend. It’s always the half-breeds who are the most bigoted, in their efforts to deny their natures.

Especially, too, to the little princess. There are some days I can scarcely bear to breathe around her. Thank you, Lord Mother, for unrequited crushes.

But physical nausea—or psychic, I suppose—isn’t what I meant. That’s understandable. It’s expected. We’re enemies. I try to eat from her, so, she tries to hurt me. It's all just instinctive; nothing personal, no hard feelings. She has less restraint, less judgement, fewer constraints, and, therefore the upper hand. That’s all right. I can afford to cede minor victories. Why grudge the gadfly it’s bloody little supper when you’re holding a swatter and a can of bugspray? That’s just petty.

No, I don’t care about her. It’s him that gets to me. Him, the good, the pure, the wasteful spineless imbecile. I can’t bear to talk to him, let alone to get close, find out what gets to him, tease him and feed off him like the others.

I can’t even stand to look at him. Potent and effulgent and innocent in his vacuity, he hasn’t got the spine to say ‘Stop hitting me.’ He hasn’t got the sense to even resent it. And she hurts when she hits. I know. Believe me, I know. But I am made to smile.

He could stop her. Any time, any moment, any number of ways. She may be a tough little thing, but he’s just as tough, and much larger. Would it require so much intelligence to say, ‘hey, I don’t like it when you do that’? These are words of one syllable. They’re all in his vocabulary. He could ask her to stop. He could make her stop. He could walk away. Nothing holds him to her, not even a promise. Nothing but his own assumptions.

I talked to him about it once. I made sure to use short words. “Why do you let her hit you?” I asked. I sat on the other side of the fire. I can’t be near that happy-go-lucky puppy-man.

“Girls and boys tease each other when they like each other,” he told me cheerfully.

“She’s not a little girl,” I said. “You’re not a little boy. It’s not teasing.”

“Nobody’s just exactly right,” he said earnestly, “so if you find somebody good you have to put up with the wrong bits. That’s what love is.”

He thought he was telling me something.

Even the bleakest, most endless yin is traced and shot through with shining yang. Dragons hate. Demons love. I have a thousand years and more, and I could have told him one thing, if he could have heard it: loyalty isn't love. I had a thousand years, and spent them all on my knees, chained and wired, a ventriloquist’s marionette.

We have intelligence, but no will. No will. None. None of us. I do as my master wishes. She does as her Lord demands. His mother bade him, “Destroy.”

My mother-master-mistress is my darkness and my light. My lady-lord is my torment and my blessing. Her voice moves my bones. Her smile thrills my blood. Her favor wards me, her scent bedazzles, her touch is ecstatic agony and unendurable comfort.

I’d give it all up to say ‘no.’ Just ‘no’. Just, ‘No, I don’t want to do that.’ No, I don’t want to kill that. No, I don’t want to seduce that. No, I don’t want to grovel. To kneel. To beg, trick, feed, tease, smilesmilesmilesmilesmile for your ease. Please don’t give me pain. Please, don’t make me want. What I’d give to walk away…

When I’m from her, I cannot move my body to act. When I’m near her, I can’t even think it. I am a demon, and so I am owned.

The Mother of All gave them, gave humans, free will. What do they do with this most precious of all gifts? Why, emulate us, of course, in the warm embrace of the lowest common denominator. What does he, most blessed of the children of light, do with his free will?

He wills himself a slave. He gives up. He gives up himself, his defense, and calls it love.

I cannot but abhor his contempt of freedom, who am the Wolf Lord’s dog.