“Stubbornness looks good on you.”
Juri shakes his head, incredulous. "Really, Jesse? Are you flirting with me? On a moment like this?"
A moment like this, huh? They're standing in the middle of a beautiful, flowery meadow, back to back, while being surrounded by a dozen of human-like gravel demons, all holding sharp arrow-ended spears. The demons were just on their way to wreak havoc in the nearest village when Jesse and Juri happened to come across with them. Isn't this as good a moment as any?
Jesse shrugs, but it makes the nearest demon startle and press the tip of his spear against his neck, so he decides to stay still from now on. "Nah, flirting with you would be wasted effort. You only have eyes for-"
He is cut off by the leader of the demons arriving. The leader is male-presenting, tall, and heavily built, almost handsome even. It is a mere trick though. Like most demons, gravel demons are skilled shapeshifters.
The underling demons circling around Jesse and Juri jump a couple steps back to make room for the leader.
"What do we have here?" The leader says slowly, like he is enjoying every syllable. "Guardians of light and fire."
"We're not bothered by a bit of sunrays or heat," one of the demons growls, and the others snicker.
"Yeah, we're made of rocks," another giggles. As smart as a stick, that one.
"Oh." Jesse smiles at them sweetly. He rolls his shoulders, cracks his neck and waves his hand up like saying goodbye. “So I wonder, what happens to you if the heat is taken away. He snaps his open palm into a fist.
The puffs of the surprised demons’ breaths turn visible and white. Stunned gasps and pained shrieks fill the air. Oops. Is it too mean to smile?
“And darkness?” Juri says, the light of his eyes fading as a shadow lands upon him. It spreads swiftly out around him until it swallows them all like a pitch black veil. “That's really just absence of light.”
The demons shriek in terror, having lost their vision. Jesse feels Juri's hand on his shoulder, and his eyes start to catch the outlines of the demons juddering in the grass again. The distress is forcing them to decline back to their true forms: big, lizard-like creatures whose rough skin resembles gravelly rock.
"And they're not alone either," a loud, cheerful bellow echoes from somewhere outside their dark sphere. Jesse feels dewdrops floating up from the grass, and he grins. Juri gives Jesse's shoulder a squeeze. They are ready.
"Now!" Shintaro yells to them.
Juri releases the light he was holding in a blinding flash. Shintaro leaps to their side and, with one wave of his hand, guides the gathered-up dew to fall on the gravel demons. Jesse waits for just one more inhale and exhale before he holds up both his hands and snaps then into fists.
The water condensed between the rocks of the demons expands as it freezes, and the stony lizards shatter down into piles of gravel and sand, thus returning into what they all originally were. The demon spirits scream and evaporate into the thin air.
“Now that was easy,” Shintaro says, grinning. “Almost embarrassingly so.”
Jesse releases the warmth and answers Shintaro's smile.
“You're late."
"Nah, I wasn't hurrying. And you seemed to be doing just fine on your own," Shintaro says, winking at them. Juri's face does something funny, like he is trying very hard to hide how much even the smallest praise from Shintaro pleases him. Too bad he is literally beaming in the afternoon sun. Jesse snorts.
"Come on guys, let's return to the tent. We won't be back home by the evening if we don't hurry up a bit."
They turn to leave, but Juri stops to look at the scattered-around gravel like he’s suddenly thought of something. He frowns and looks at the others.
"I didn't think those things could travel this far from their origins."
Jesse and Shintaro stop as well. Juri is right; gravel demons typically spawn in dry, open cliffsides or treeless mountaintops. There aren't any such places in their territory.
"Unless..." Shintaro starts slowly, but doesn't elaborate. All at once, they turn to look towards the west, where distant mountains rise from the earth.
"We should send a message to Shoppi and the others as soon as we get home," Juri says, frowning still. “If these demons came from their territory, they’ll want to know. And if they already know, they’ll want to know the demons are traveling.”
~
It’s late at night when they arrive at the shrine and tiptoe into their bedroom where their three friends are sleeping side by side under their coverings.
“Jesse?” Kochi asks in a sleep-groggy voice.
“Yeah, just us. We’re home.”
“Welcome,” Taiga murmurs from his bed and probably falls asleep a mere moment after.
Jesse, Juri, and Shintaro get under their sheets. Jesse closes his eyes and is seconds from falling asleep when he hears Shintaro’s voice from his place between Kochi and Taiga.
“You know, Jesse and Juri were awfully cool today.”
The room lights up as if both the sun and the moon had just fallen through their ceiling. Except that it shines out from Juri’s bed.
Hokuto groans and buries his head under his coverings. "Shut up Shintaro, we’re trying to sleep. And Juri you goddamn glowworm, lights off!"