The Metal

Another day, another sermon. The kami sat on the street curb and sighed, the last member of her congregation had departed after receiving some advice about her boyfriend who insisted on getting drunk and beating her every night, and the night had settled like some dark animal over the slums of the Commons.
In the alleyways, the darkness, she could hear the rustlings of wicked creatures... faint crunchings and hisses, hunters in the darkness looking for the homeless and others foolish enough to be out when the thick cover of night cloaked the eyes of any human witnesses and the police were more absent than usual.
The trailer was behind her, should she enter it, she could expect to spend the night unmolested. She couldn't detect any immediate threats, however, so she simply sat, absorbing the nasty air and reflecting over her time on Earth so far. She would have to add a praise and worship section to her sermon. She furrowed her brows in thought as she tried to recall one of the songs they used to sing in choir in heaven.

*

Settling immediately next to the other, the kami stretched and lay down next to him, not knowing of anything besides innocence in the gesture. "You seem tired, very tired. Have you been selling plenty of plants?"
The question had a vestige of concern in it, but was more of a conversation opener.
*Learned Tsunami
*Learned Kamitransformation
*Learned Myst

The kami grinned broadly, a rare expression on her face. "It is going very well. The congregation is growing. I helped a man whose daughter had been killed in a demon attack, so his daughter and he have really been getting the word out. I should be able to afford a small building to preach in soon. It could double as a soup kitchen and women's shelter on the other six days of the week... I meant to ask you..."
She turned to face him, her brows furrowed. "I have heard they have something called 'hospitals' on this plane where the sick and the wounded go and lay in beds. Do you know where such a place would be?"
*Learned Tsunami
*Learned Kamitransformation
*Learned Myst

Atilla sighed, troubled and unhappy with the statement, though it seemed casual enough. One's chosen target being a destructive force of nature who wanted to bring down an age old city for his own pleasure... well, it seemed like she should at least try to reach a compromise, as futile as such a prospect seemed.
Raising up a bit, she rolled over so her elbows were on his chest, the better to make eye contact. "I understand that you want to... destroy things, Takashou-sama, but perhaps there lay some deeper reasoning behind this impulse? Surely no human has wronged you at any point..."
*Learned Tsunami
*Learned Kamitransformation
*Learned Myst

The kami could hardly comprehend what he meant, restraint being such an integral part of her personality. It would be like asking a lake if it appreciated its dam. "Holding... back?" Her brow furrowed in thought, she was putting her best foot forward in trying to understand the perception of her the inquiry seemed to paint. "You are saying... that I must hold myself back in order to serve Bleaus," she concluded at length, the words coming slowly, as though each syllable were pieces of a puzzle she was putting into place. Honestly, self-control seemed a reflex now. She continued, gentle and ponderous. "The question you ask is complicated. You see, I wish to do this. Nobody is forcing me, Bleaus gives all of the kami beneath him free will, should I turn wild one day, wild I will be, but... I do not take pleasure in the pain of others, in the loathsome ash, in the faded memory, in the ruins of greatness. I take pleasure in peace. I take pleasure in wholeness, in the beauty of creation, in both what God builds and what people, who are but shades of the spirit, accomplish by imitation... sugar, beautiful buildings, art above all else... what is good, what is lovely, what is perfect... these things. Art and accomplishment comes from people not only living, but flourishing. The things that are pleasant to the eye and restful to the spirit come from a happy, healed nation. That is what I seek to propagate and protect in the humans. Does it pain you to silence a knowledge of what is beautiful long enough to destroy it? To look upon loveliness and by your own hand make it a horror and a tragedy? To mar perfection?"
*Learned Tsunami
*Learned Kamitransformation
*Learned Myst

Atilla sighed, finding that unlike her he seemed a slippery eel to catch with this sort of rhetoric. Despite everything, her argument style was very confrontational, and it confused her a little to have someone so cleanly sidestep her questions.
Perhaps he didn't understand why he wanted to barbecue the city in the same way she supposed the sea eagle wasn't one hundred percent sure what sent him flying low after fish, or why the mountain goats needed to butt heads on a steep mountainside in spite of the fact that such fighting could easily send them both to their deaths over something. Rather, this want had to be some drive that would be vestigial in a modern, cooperative society, some outward manifestation of his carnivorous nature that exalts in suffering.
But her thoughts were beginning to run into one another, and her eyelids were getting heavy. "I am glad you haven't."
Resting her head on the demon's chest, she listened to the steady beat and closed her eyes, beginning to drift off.
*Learned Tsunami
*Learned Kamitransformation
*Learned Myst