The Demon Slayer Corps Initiative

Solace

Click, clack, click, clack.

Only the sounds of her shoes tapping against the floor echoed throughout the night as she trudged home, exhausted and defeated. Mentally battered and broken.

It is always possible to feel physical pain, even when you haven't been broken or cracked on the exterior. It always hurts more when someone hurts you on the inside.

Now she felt the crippling shame and the weight of what she had done coursing through her body, coming back to dish out retribution in the form of horrible waves of guilt.

They hate me now. I know it.

The dissapointment crushed her even more when the image of their shocked, ghostly pale faces flashed in her mind, and she winced at the thought of their mouths hung slightly ajar, the whites of their eyes widening themselves to reveal shrunken irises and pupils, rimmed with fear at her unsightly outburst.

"What would Professor Rengoku and Kocho say? What would Father say? What would Tanjiro say?"

She usually let her pride get the better of her, making excuses to justify her actions- but this time, she couldn't deny it. Her sensitivity had let her pent up emotions spiral out of control- the faculty probably had decided on extending her punishment all the way to August for talking back to her superiors.

"I'm an idiot, I'm such an idiot!"

She felt her stomach churn with a feeling bearing some resemblance to a mixture of dread and relief once she arrived at her house's front porch, lit merely by a flickering light, the bulb of which they didn't have enough money to replace.

She should probably turn that off before the electrical bill skyrockets itself.

Another plethora of silent sounds echoed throughout the frigid night air- the sound of her fingers gently flicking the light switch off, enveloping the surrounding area in nigh complete darkness. The deafening silence that followed the two knocks carefully administered to the door caused Nezuko to bite her lip a tad bit too aggressively- yet she immediately straightened herself when the door opened with an agonizingly loud creak.

Her father, Tanjuro Kamado, stared back at her with the same kind, tired eyes that Tanjiro bore- not with the disappointment that she expected to crush her upon her late arrival, but with sympathy. He tucked a lock of curly burgundy hair behind his ear, all of which was tied up into a high ponytail, his gesture being followed by an awkward cough.

"Heard what happened at school today," he murmured.

"I was just trying to help, Baba-" Nezuko spoke before she was interrupted by glancing back to the gentle smile forming on his cheeks.

"You work too hard. I should be the one coming home absurdly late, not you. You are doing everything you already can- the last thing I want you to do is to push yourself too hard in your pursuit to help others, Nezuko," he whispered. Oh, how she wanted to cry when he gently cupped her cheek and escorted her inside, away from the drafty night's breeze of the dark.

"I can see the resemblance between you and Tanjiro- besides the forehead birthmark," she mumbled jokingly, rubbing the bags underneath her eyes that felt so similar to weights. "You let your individual sense of responsibility get in the way of- well, everything."

Maroon eyes seemed to glisten with an almost youthful mischief in response. "I would be in denial, but now I see what you mean," Tanjuro joked before the two erupted into a fit of silent giggles. The two spoke the same language and shared the same exhaustion seamlessly amongst each other, both of them collapsing onto the creaky chair back settee that substituted for a regular couch. By now, their back had grown used to the dull ache that it had caused.

"How was school? Besides the whole hacking part," he asked.

Nezuko gave a light yawn. "Great, to be honest- I got to spend time with my friends today. A lot of people were clueless in history class today," she murmured before her face shifted into a slightly incredulous expression. "Well, of course I know who Elizabeth Von Schmitzernoff is. Mother of Solar Radiowave Theory and progenitor of the DIY Particle Reactor, thank you very much," she haughtily stated, crossing her arms and nonchalantly leaning back into her seat.

"Right," Tanjuro replied, chuckling heartily. "Every scientist and engineer hails her as the messiah of the Radiochemical reactor, especially me as a child- I would've had posters of her hung all over my room had I not grown up in the lower middle class."

Nezuko sighed. "She paved the way for prototypical holographic engineering as well... what wouldn't I give to walk through the doors of the mighty Kasugai University? But alas, you need at least one Ph.D from Cambridge or Princeton to even be considered somewhat worthy of walking through the door," she grumbled before feeling a comforting hand on her shoulder.

Warm, just like the afternoon sun.

"We'll get there, okay?" Tanjuro whispered. "We're almost there."

"No, father..." Nezuko replied, wrapping her arms around him in a tight embrace as though he were a lifeline. "In my mind... we're already there."

Their brief moment of peaceful silence was suddenly interrupted by loud crashing and the loud yelling of children's voices upstairs- the phrases mingling together to form brief snippets of sentences such as "Ow!" and "Quit it- stop-" and "It's not fair!"

Pink eyes sparkled with curiosity and doubt. "What were my younger siblings doing this entire time?"

Tanjuro shared an equally dubious look with his eldest daughter. "They were pretending to be asleep."

An exasperated sigh left partially dried lips, and a soft, breathy moan left Nezuko's mouth as she stood up and began to trudge up the stairs, flashing her father a knowing smile. "Well- look's like they were not pretending well enough."

Guess it's up to her to convince them to calm down.