The Melody Of Two Swords

The First Beat

They don't greet each other as they slow from their circling. Instead, a thick silence fills the space in-between them. It's ominous and disconcertingly still, too still. Like even the wind seems scared to break it. But even though the air is cold and strangely stiff, there's undying heat under Kagami's skin and in his blood that warms him, as he stares down the man standing just beyond swords reach.

A short moment passes, but even though it's short, it seems to stretch on for millennia. Dimly, Kagami's aware that there's a growing crowd forming around them, waging gold on who will win and who will lose. But all thoughts of that fade into dust as Aomine draws his sword.

It's a simple movement. A necessary one, at that, but it sets off alarm bells in Kagami's ears and has him reaching for his own sword with a sudden, overwhelming sense of urgency. Despite the threat of an impending attack, Aomine makes no move to engage. Instead, sword loosely dangling in hand, he just stands there; his eyes hooded, and the temperature in them set cooler than the first winter snow.

Come and get me, they seem to say. Taunt even.

If you can.

Kagami knows he's being baited, but that's what he was planning on doing, so he bite's anyway.

His first attack he makes sure that it comes down hard. First strikes are typically obvious, rarely the last, and are usually just a way to test the waters of an opponent, but Kagami throws that to the wind and makes sure to throw his weight behind his blade as he spins into motion to leave no doubt in Aomine's mind that if he want's to win then he's going to make him work for it.

Just like he'd anticipated, the block comes out of nowhere and the sheer force behind it.

Kagami is by no means weak, but when Aomine's sword materialises—out of what seems to be thin air—and pushes back against the weight of his attack, his bones rattle so bad that it feels like the very flesh on his bones could come right off. But he stands his ground, refusing to let Aomine turn his blow aside, and resists the urge to wince at the grating, strangled noise their blades make as their masters grapple for dominance.

It could be minutes or it could be hours that they spend pacing their way across the ring; trading jabs and vicious slices but they do not tire. Meeting Aomine blow for blow is exhausting. It's like he knows the most awkward angles to strike from—the ones where the sun is in Kagami's eyes, or where he has to aggravate an old injury to block him—but it's exhilarating. He barely has time to think; just has to let his body move how it feels natural—let his body respond to Aomine's.

It's an easy rhythm, an easy song to get lost in.

No matter what Aomine throws at him, he pushes it back. And it doesn't get easier. Just the opposite, in fact. Aomine gets more inventive with his attacks, and Kagami in return, has to get more creative with how he defends.

Kagami has never tried to fight a raging winter tempest with nothing but the clothes on his back and a borrowed sword, but he thinks that this must be the what it's like. He's seen with his own damn eyes that the guy has one sword, but it feels like he's wielding a dozen of them—as soon as he deflects one blow there's another one coming at him at an impossible angle at impossible speed—and Kagami has to channel every ounce of his concentration into making sure that none of them hit their mark. And if they do, it's nothing fatal, even with blunted swords, getting hit with one full force hurts.

But it's different now. Kagami can't quite explain what or how he knows it has, but something's changed. Something's shifted. Over the how many long years that he's fought Aomine, he knows that he's not content to just sit back to let him slave away trying to break him down. He wants to break him right back—seems to want to push him; make him bleed. Or rather see if he can.

But it doesn't feel like he wants to kill him.

Far from it, actually. It's like he wants to see if he can keep up with him.

Kagami gets it, and he's happy to oblige. He's going to keep up with whatever Aomine can throw at him.

Out of all the songs in the world, this is Kagami's favourite.