***Going to go ahead and insert this, a little disclaimer that came a little too late; but please keep in mind this chapter is a bit more on the background side, scratch that, it is entirely background and stage setting. The rest of the story will NOT mirror this first chapter in that sense. I posted part two in attempts to validate this, so if you can stomach the tedious building blocks of part one, you can see where the true heart and nature of the story lies. If nothing else, you can skip all my strung out psycho babble below this that's probably more off putting than good marketing. Very much so hope this changes the reception of the story***
**also, wow, botched the author of the first quote, it's by Kazuo Ishiguro not Haruki Maruakami, for whatever reason I had them merged , the quotes that is, since they were right above/below each other in the same archive of quotes I'd been collectnig and writing down, whooopsie daisy*
Yeah, so, essentially I don't think I've written and or uploaded anything on here for over, oh I don't know, a good year, two, three, orrr more? Every other story becoming more or less a dead end of most recent chapters my computers crashed and lost the drafts to, or I just wrote too many versions, couldn't finish period, or some combination of those. However, seeing as I've been on a K binge for the past year or so, I finally got it into my head that I'd write a little something, never my intention to post it, but, well, the process looked more or less like this:
(¬‿¬) I'm totally going to write a K fanfic. !o◡O! I JUST STAYED UP FOR 48 HOURS WRITING A K FANFIC, ◉●◉ o0o, it's pretty (╥﹏╥) this is the worst.\ (•◡•) / Just kidding, I LOVE IT, ◉_◉ , don't post it, dear god, don't post it, (─‿‿─) I'm posting it. !O.O! but I should go over it once more, 24 more hours of useless editing later, (≖_≖ ) what does any of this crap mean? (҂◡̀_◡́)ᕤ damn you editing. But. I'm so. Awake.(◑_◑) I should. Write. More. ◉_◉ no, no you should not. (¬‿¬) *nudge* just post it. X_x too dead to care anymore, \ (•◡•) / I'LL DO IT!
So please forgive me for any and all lapses in grammar and talent as I've grown rusty over the years, lol, as well as forgiving my sudden flashback to fifth grade and going bat shit crazy with ascii ctrl alt whatever lettering and emoticons, I'll blame that on this ongoing lack of sleep for now. Anyways, I don't really have any idea how long this fic will be, however, I don't fancy it will be anything too extensive, I only have two parts, and the start of the third so far. This first part being more so Fushimi's perspective, segueing into the proper aspects of the plot, the second more so actual interactions, albeit I'm most skeptical about that part as it transitions from beginning to end. Anywho, that's irrelevant for now.
Which, OH, in general, the basis for this fic, and basically all you need to know, for those of you familiar with the show in its entirety, is that it takes place after the second season, specifically with the focus of how Yata and Fushimi's relationship transitions after they've evidently made amends enough to reestablish their long lost friendship, however I chose to write under the pretense that Fushimi initially resits and avoids the situation, trying to sort out all his emotional turmoil. Which is more or less part one. Also, the fic incorporates a few quotes and certain contextual background from translations of K: Lost Small World, which is the novel based on their earlier days together, all tied in with my own adaptations. AKA the definition of a fanfic, way to go Morgan, let's define the obvious. *sigh* I should really sleep more.
ANYWHO; read it, don't read it. Love it, hate it, feel backwards and forwards-ly indifferent about like I do, it's all fine by me. I just needed to break this non-posting streak of mine. Of course, reviews are greatly welcomed and highly appreciated, as well as something I take the time to respond to with each additional post. LASTLY; my own corny take on PIC4PIC, Comment 4 Comment (can't seem to recall the abbreviation anymore...) of reciprocating the love from all the way back from the Myspace Days, I do something on here, which is more less RVW4RVW, so if you review my story, I'll return the favor by reading and reviewing one of yours :)
Please let me know if that's something you'd care to have me do in your response, as well as designating if there's a particular fic you would like me to focus on :)
Hah, I also feel compelled to tack on that the disclaimer that, that my style of writing is rather analytical, allegorical, and extremely wax poetic; I tend to transition in and out of points and then support, incorporate, and surfacing parellels
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»ℙʀ✘ᵯⅈδɇȿ |✎|ẆṟⅈτʇҼƞ|✐|Ѳᵙ ẘα⊥ℇᴚ«
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"I keep thinking about this river somewhere, with the water moving really fast. And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding as hard as they can, but in the end it's too much. The currents too strong. They've got to let go, drift apart," - Kazuo Ishiguro
Fushimi begrudgingly held back a signature tsk. A force of habit that suddenly felt unnatural. The stunted intonation that escaped his throat into auditory range no longer slighting but defeated; a voluntarily self-deprecating sound that he was too distracted to feign. Too busy staring at the unfamiliarly eloquent stationary lines and arching strokes that curved effortlessly into script—how absolutely human his handwriting looked—so foreign and far removed from the cold, calculative numerical code he'd spent a lifetime perfecting to fit him flawlessly. Like a second set of skin that neither sticks nor stones could penetrate, let alone reach even a fraction of bone. So aware of the world that you couldn't even hurt his feelings, not on the surface anyways, not really. Not as long as he turned inside out and wore his skeleton instead.
No need for saving face when the one you showcased wasn't really yours, an inexpressive canvas that concealed any and every admission of actual emotion. The perfect combination of intrigue, disinterest, and likelihood of being disparaged when taken too lightly. It was no more than a strategic advantage he'd been born with as far as he was concerned, although it may, in truth, have favored survival rather than strategy. It made little difference, he took hold of them and he evolved, this was all adaptive after all. Evolutionary. Survival of the fittest. A finite science. Things he understood. There was no room for something as toilsome as feelings in such an equation, they allotted too much unnecessary sway, they were messy and convoluted, the only intangibility worthy of his time was that which could be warped. Tangible, touchable facets that he could twist and turn against anyone foolish enough to reach forward.
Fragile features could be just as deceptive as superficial muscle mass, and Fushimi had no need for amassed epidermal baggage to protect himself when he'd constructed this chainmail out of the very cartilage that kept him standing. Skin was too weak and revealing, damaged by the elements and unable to properly heal with time; while the skeletal structure was as strong as cast iron and as light as fiberglass, adaptable to functional demand and almost instantaneously able to repair itself. Swallowing his opponents like marrow, it was the ultimate defense, like a bioweapon within the body, intricate, concealed, and too complex to crack. Whereas flesh had never been a friend to him, to Fushimi, flesh was like a firewall that failed to uphold its purpose, outwardly communicating everything the second it was stabbed, composed of three entirely different layers and subdivided categorically, but unable to stop the flow of blood.
Bones didn't bleed.
But they drew it painlessly, in the blink of an eye, leaving many an adversary in a dazed, disoriented stupor, so fixated on their external surroundings that they never saw it coming. Angered and agitated by the boy who'd brought grown men to their knees without a single scratch, this nondescript individual who kept a few more than just a few tricks up his sleeve, dexterity and mental precision that went unrivaled and far beyond the comprehension of the common man, there was a reason he was renown as one of the most desirable hidden weapons users. Invading all forms of personal security because that was the way of survival for those who were never raised, experts of invisibility. Whether by defect or design, children learn not by coincidence but by choice, even when they were not their own, they were still required to live with them. Just as he did his. The possessions he'd inherited in place of parents, brought into the world without his consent.
The product of irresponsibility and adolescence, the mistake of two nineteen year olds who had failed to correct it in time. He was merely a consequence they were now required to keep, like impulsively buying a pet you realized you didn't want to take care of, their interest was lost the second they'd peered through the glass and given him name with no meaning. Or perhaps their mutual disinterest had been decided long before the idea of loving him had even crossed their minds. Because most newborns leave the hospital with their parents, a mother and a father, and a new home somewhere in the horizon that their little eyes weren't even developed enough to see; except he'd learned to see much differently than just most children, and as far as Fushimi was concerned, they were no more than strangers who buckled him into a carseat and drove him someplace where he took his meals and went to sleep at night, there was never any family, and certainly never one that brought him home. It was just a house. With windows and doors, four walls, and a roof—no, that wasn't right either, four was far too simple, the number of walls in that house seemed to grow exponentially—after all, they were impossible to walk through.
Fundamentally ideal and indicative of the complete disinterest and commonplace existence of impersonal identities that didn't wish to be disturbed, who didn't want the first or last thing to do with one another let alone the constant disruption of having to see their faces. Isolation being the entire objective and nothing more. Or maybe that's just what wealthy people did when they wanted to produce an illusion of stability, building and building like a balancing act, desperately overcompensating for the fact there was no real foundation, just intercepting rows of dominos waiting to topple. Having put too much emphasis on the importance of the exterior to lose sleep over such contrived triviality. And paying the price. That had been one of his first lessons, one of those childhood observations that didn't quite click, never understanding the point of putting up such a superficial front or what compelled them to exhaust such unnecessary resources if they weren't going to be applied to the proper places, the inability to fathom why it possibly mattered what something looked like on the outside if everything on the inside was falling apart.
"…you don't need a home like that."
The sound of that voice in his head made him shudder, the genuine concern and underlying sentiment rifting around the room in what had become such a chilling cadence, the simplicity of his own one bedroom flat becoming an unwanted reminder of something else entirely, something much heavier. The looming evidence of the presence of the last ghost he wanted to be haunted by when there were already far too many in the room with him already.
Feeling stupid, clicking his tongue as if an insult were about to form with flawless execution, only to find something stopping him. Something interfering, something shutting down, something standing very unmistakably in the way. Like a command control he couldn't override, his thoughts clotting, forming like cancerous masses in his throat. A sort of sadness that dissipated before it could take shape, scattering and dispersing as he sank into the back of his seat, even toned as always and closing his eyes. The incertitude eliciting the sudden desire to respond without question losing out to the concession of such a low, mollified voice, "That wasn't where my home was," Fushimi corrected with no specific emotion. "Not even close."
That was the beauty of the lesson he'd learned as a child, the ignorance that wasn't bliss, but a sense of balance, having complete and total control of his outward appearance allowed him to fortify what was on the inside, the stability to keep standing by denying his features their very right to fall out of place. Convinced and ensured by the self preserving strategy that, to be a skeleton, he must learn to cast a proper shadow, like a puppet along the walls. Even though they bent at his fingertips, even though they moved in motion with the rest of him, every image was superficial, and all the strings were carefully attached. And there was no one better qualified to pull them than himself, producing this marionette-like limitation of any and all expression. A mouth that moved, but never truly spoke. Painted eyes that saw everything, but revealed nothing. Arms and legs all dancing on seven strings, twisting, but never tangling, like some quadruped beast, emulating basic shapes from a safe distance.
Predisposed to the superiority of symmetry, the importance of proportional illusory, he'd never had anything come quite so naturally or confuse everybody else so laughably. Most people didn't want the truth, he supposed, only tickets to see the show, and who was he to deny them that? To prevent them from eating the bait from the palm of his hand all while willingly paying the designated price? The refusal to work out the details because it was so far less fun than being fooled, so why not let them be fools? he'd thought, selling out as he set about developing such an art. A man of a thousand faces, a shadow that no longer required the light, he perfected his craft too masterfully and it wasn't long before he lost sight of the stage. Act and actor both an embodiment and isolation of true self, absorbing, reflecting, and ultimately rejecting the fruits of his labors, the very secrets of his success, the lack of awareness that the audience was no longer the one being fooled.
And loving every second. Far more desirable than the intended result, second nature rivaling mere skill. Something so much harder to understand, and even harder to deconstruct, a little well known fact how effectively men fear what they did not know, the resultant desire to possess what they'd never before seen. And that's the exact reputation he needed to build, for the world to follow, the infamous uniqueness to effortlessly blend in.
An apprehended air of unpredictability that inevitably kept others at bay or unprepared for the collision of a plastic casing they couldn't pierce, that kept everything inside from ever falling apart, so contradictorily aware of the fragility that he took any means necessary to protect it. And when manacled joints began to mobilize, whenever something got too close, he simply solidified and shut it out completely, never breaking character, carrying on with the show. And when that didn't work, when the rarity of the proximal phenomenon in which the perceived object accomplished the equal grounds upon which to be deemed a threat, then Fushimi reached inside and tore the damn thing out himself. No matter the pain. No matter the loss. He'd experienced it once too many to ever grant anybody that kind of power over him again.
They were unnecessary anyways, more an occupational hazard than a vital feature—just complimentary software that could be dragged to the trash and emptied—erasing all the valuable space it was taking up and deactivating the required actions for recovery. Better given to something constructive, less heavy and easier to hold. Something specialized that couldn't just be accessed by just anyone, personalized to the point it had to be given and was no ones to take. And he'd never allow the latter let alone consider what came beforehand, there was a saying about hearts after all, and I believe it goes hand in hand with the word broken.
Another thing he couldn't afford. Physical properties already struggling now that they'd been stripped of their support beams, transitioning self proclaimed strength into social perception. The endless stereotypes he'd always battled unraveling to reveal more fact than fiction and far more infuriation as his fist furrowed into the bunching fabric against his thigh. Teeth not quite pulled into a tsk, but mirroring the motions.
Lithe and graceful, he was often underestimated, invalidated, and denounced. "Weak. Nerd. Four Eyes." No adjective or insult that rivals even an iota of intelligence, as elementary and ineffective as the overcompensating school bullies who spouted them. An unintentional semblance of a smile crept into the corner of his cheek, temporarily losing sight of self analysis, a sort of involuntarily necessitating narrative that was constantly reaffirming his own inadequacy, and then falling back into the ideas and emotions that had originally triggered the ongoing cycle. The rare occasion to be real again. The touch and go footage of a discarded leather wallet being carelessly tossed, the collision of something so small and no better suited than himself whose presence carried such a fierce intensity.
The silhouette of a stranger he'd never spoken with intercepting and stepping between an otherwise routine process for Fushimi, for seemingly no better reason than reaffirming his own sense of purpose. His own way of fighting off the feeling of falling apart. Selfish, maybe, and something that at the time he himself had seen only for the weakness and stupidity of such evident disparity; however, it was the first time anybody else had ever tugged at his strings. So brief, but secretly unprecedented, that it'd caught him off guard. The subtlest spark of curiosity that caused him to lose sight of them, those strings, never noticing in those ten minutes that he'd dropped them.
The rare sight of Fushimi in motion, however short lived, had been exhilarating.
Feeling so unendurably depleted and fragmentary, the memory reel bleeding into the ferocity of redirected disdain and disinterest that followed, the evident damage he'd inflicted, successful. And the correlation had been that of negative proportion, only drawing the opposition more inundated, more undeniably. Until the long since revisited scenes projecting through his eyes fast forwarded to the almost inaudible click-clank-shhf of an unhinging latch in an unsuspecting bathroom stall, an unanticipated invitation that he himself had not been particularly fond of, but extended nonetheless. To that person of all people, irksome the manner in which their personalities should have repelled and resisted like two opposing magnets, vexatious the way they clung and clicked instead; invasive and interruptive, so agitating this interest with his facade of indifference was.
And yet, in the silence, in the off-standish seconds spent inside the tan and taupe colored enclosure that gave them little more than a few feet of space and a toilet seat, systematically spinning cubes, he had pretended not to have noticed that presence emanating such uncensored fascination from the floor by his feet. More or less disinterested until the it was no longer the game nor self imposed prospect of inclusion in the opposing pair of eyes. It was him. Those eyes had lost interest in anything else, the focus shifting, golden irises encasing him mesmerically, morphing in and out of an intuitive understanding, a thoughtful and genuine sincerity so unaccustomed that Fushimi almost felt something akin to embarrassment.
Nobody had ever looked at him that way. It made him shiver, although he'd never have admitted it, blank fascination blurring into a fluttery sort of anxiety, sensing his own exposure, those eyes across from him that seemed to go plaintive in their silence. The auras of beaten gold and flecked amber that appeared to say, "you're trapped," but pried no further. Neither dilating nor constricting in speculation, never refocusing or trying to understand or even ask why, just this silent knowledge that lacked ulterior motive. So pure. So spot on. So unexpected that, for the first time, Fushimi's world unintentionally opened up, even if just a fraction, and allowed another to enter.
Such a pivotal moment that even now he felt it palpitate in his chest, the immediacy of a suppressed sensation resuscitating too potently that he shoved it back into the deepest recesses of his mind until the flashback tapered off in a vacant flickering. Overwhelmed and well aware he'd redirected his own automatic train of thought in avoidance, but to what, although resistant, he knew exactly.
It was the sound of death and distant thunder, a delicate sort of suffering that came in the form of a dull rumbling, the pulmonary restriction of breathes held whenever he gave into these false notions of hope. The vulnerability that wrapped around his throat because his memories were like a noose that bound him, that only tightened as he struggled with what had become incompatible. Time. Past and present never failing to align in never ending resonance, looming overhead with darkening skies that began to leak, into the fibers, into the rope, until it started to strangle him more quickly as he drown. Unable to keep his head above a storm that couldn't be stopped, despite his dissent. The emotions entangled and just as much apart of him, struck down by the vast divisions between depths of darkness and different affiliations with the light. The absolute truth that there was no absolute truth, but in attempts to argue against was no different than admitting existence in the first place, and the contradictory nature of his thoughts became intolerable.
Streaks of scarlet and constant static striking twice as currents of atmospheric electricity discharged, casting blinding flashes of blue and white, cutting through the sky and colliding with the surface where they sank and submerged alongside him. Goddamn, it hurt so bad. Surrounded and swallowed, although he could no longer speak, vision disjoining and hearing canceling out, the uncertain timing of a certain end sick of chasing at his heals and holding him prisoner instead. Even if for just an instant, it was enough to illuminate that, he who hesitates is truly lost. Weighed down by the differences between the way things were and the way they ought to be. And all the shit he still couldn't say.
Pathetic, he sighed, pushing away from the desk.
Feeling skeletal tissue disintegrate and decay, impenetrable counterparts losing formation to the divide, the inextricable void his voice had cascaded, cut off, and cast him into without warranting approval. As if that self-created sense of security he'd sewn together with more or less indifference to begin with had snagged beneath the wheels of a skateboard and steadily unraveled. And it infuriated him to no end how willingly his subconscious had betrayed him. Despite the preexisting awareness that he was much too calculative and far too controlling of his minds inner workings to have let something so impressionable just slip through undetected. And that acknowledgment was a watered down drink that was too difficult to swallow. Unable to displace or dilute the self reproach of an intractable forfeit.
Sticks and stones, he reiterated absently, maintaining a mental structure to map out even his own private unfolding of thought, too meticulous, and arguably paranoid to leave any such openings. As if there was anything left to break, he almost laughed, that bitter self loathing sinking in so far that it too became indecipherable. The armor. The disdain. The painfully evident discomfort. The sheet of paper upstaging the shut, sealed, and silenced PDA and personal computer alike. Proof enough that somewhere, lurking beneath the mechanical cogs, was someone who's face he hadn't worn in years. An innocent, fragile place that was precious to him. The interconnecting anthills tunneling through the vast intricacies of what he feared to revisit because the fear itself was of failing it. Again. Of disappointing the only something that had ever been something. For the second time.
Or was it the third? Fourth? Fifth? He'd lost count.
Something much softer than scoffing and scowling that he'd both sacrificed and severed in a single breath. That's how easily it had fallen. I didn't huff, certainly didn't puff, and yet rendered everything structureless. Fushimi hadn't even needed words, those small minded insults he loathed, no, he'd learned to live with the language that was action. Forward motion, forgetting the past, but forwards didn't mean he'd ever stopped falling, motion was a fickle beast like that. And with no other way to supply the right words he'd never found, considered, or believed would've mattered, he'd taken Isaac Newton's so called 'laws of motion,' and decided to see just how effective they'd be in battle. Not that I'd wanted a battle, I never wanted anything that…vindictive…all I ever wanted…
Tsk. This time it couldn't be helped, and he was certain even Edison was turning his grave with laugher while Newton slapped his knee and fathomed how to conceive the resultant stupidity of what had been Fushimi's 'bright idea.' Incorporating universal laws with something he'd somehow forgotten was a person and not a science fair project, forgetting those things called feelings that he'd never cared for himself still existed in others—still mattered—that they were volatile and very poor test subjects. Allowing those horrid, undignified outbursts to control, contort, and capture all his focus. The ill at ease, hand-wringing inevitability that overtook him the second he'd assessed his surroundings, an atmospheric shift immune to logic, reason, or his ability to avoid the casualty ten seconds before the crash.
An object at rest will remain at rest, so he'd let the opposing force hit him at full speed, right in the chest, with no other choice as he braced for impact; counter-wise, an object in motion will remain in motion until disrupted by an external force. Fushimi became that force. Constantly moving onward, right past the wreckage. By comparison, he may have given off the impression of stagnation, a lack of ambition or exertion, at least when the juxtaposition was side by side against him, but they were both in motion now. However their speeds had not been preset, and the velocity and the momentum that propelled them was proportionally different. He could sense it with every sideways, heart wrenching drop of his gaze, but the way it felt was much worse. Much worse. And if they continued in this pattern, undisrupted, who knows how far they may have strayed from one another, so he stood firm, and the motion ceased.
Never realizing the true extent of what surrendering to inertia would cost him.
Both objects at rest. The beginning of the end. Although it wouldn't, technically speaking, be true to say that he hadn't lifted a finger, so to be precise, he'd lifted four. That's all it took. Four fingers and a little fire, …you were supposed to understand…I just wanted you to…another tsk, projected inwardly. Internally scowling at himself for burying his head in the sand like an ostrich, just biding away his time in an empty, darkened encasement, dwelling on otherwise avoidable events he'd failed to face head on, even while doing exactly that.
A single stroke of his fingers pressed diligently against pale flesh in place of a keyboard and a subtle frown found its way across his lips, scarcely altering his usual stance for those who didn't know him beyond what they'd already decided. Who didn't know the first place to look. To see the slightly downward pull of a face that had long since forgotten how to smile, the subtle, systematic shifts and fluctuations that few and far between had even the faintest idea where to find.
And only one who knew how.
The tearing apart from the inside out of what he'd once sworn at all costs to protect, to never force another living soul to experience the heart wrenching sensation of cold hands reaching into their chest and dismantling everything they believed in. The premeditated murder of their most fundamental elements, the very components that defined them, suddenly gone without a trace. As if a hole had opened up somewhere deep inside that they couldn't find and would never recover.
Yeah. He'd taken it too far…but he'd been pushed to the precipice of an ongoing panic attack, rivaled, replaced, and run down by the first and only friend he'd ever had—ever trusted other than himself. Fading into the background of a secret base that was no longer theirs—or to be precise—into the backdrops of the best friend who no longer belonged to him. Who he selfishly never wanted to share. But if it was as simple a matter as their opposing social capacities, he could have gotten over it. Over looked the sensation in his chest as nothing more than irrational, adolescent jealously overreacting. After all, Homra was like Never-Never-Land, and the lot of them the lost boys—everyone was here for their own reasons—the group disorganized and composed of varying strengths and weaknesses and personalities that clashed and collided in constant harmony. So it's not like he himself hated everyone except that guy.
For instance, Anna, she was unsettlingly quiet and a tad bit prying with her all knowing gaze, but she'd developed a certain fondness for Fushimi, as to why or for what fathomable reason he couldn't tell you; but, admittedly, he found the silence of her company a much welcomed comfort. Compatible in their shared ability to just be—the absence of words that exhausted him to no end becoming a weight he never had to worry about—it was a curious contrast to the chaos, but one that had done more for him than he'd ever repaid. He doubted whether or not he'd even tried, scratch that, he knew, and he hadn't. Not that she'd ever asked for anything in return, just gazed through a ruby sphere at the Gloomy Fushimi, and curled up beside him the way she did her King. Although, in truth, he'd considered, more often than not, that she may have just tuned into his loneliness well ahead of the others, a concept that kept him on edge as everything worsened and went wayward.
Then of course there was Kusanagi, an unexpectedly intellectual man who may've rivaled even Fushimi's IQ, and without a doubt far exceeded his social skills, but since Kusanagi typically engaged him in a one-on-one manner, he never once felt over shadowed. Quite the opposite actually, and at times, although he felt stupid for saying so, it made him feel just a little bit special, often selected over the others to accompany their second in command on business and casual ventures alike. Somehow another member who seemed to be more in-tune with his moods than he himself had ever been.
Never dragging him to the typical "Homra" excursions—but museums and exhibits—one time even a technological expo with all sorts of gizmos and gadgets and the latest in cutting edge software. One of his well known talents, but nothing anyone had ever gone out of their way to treat as a hobby as opposed to an upper hand, taking the boy for the sheer purpose of enjoying himself. A seemingly insignificant, but deeply personal gesture for the one it'd been extended toward, never having remembered being quite so excited. Enthralled by the mechanical world, entranced by the overwhelming quantities, qualities, and endless possibilities. All of which he'd harbored carefully behind features too hesitant to have such a direct contradiction to his character exposed, of course, albeit embarrassed nonetheless when he'd shyly rejected Kusanagi's excessive kindness. Encouraging him to pick out anything he wanted, extending the implied intention of buying it for him, however Fushimi had been startled, sheepish enough to let show, then shook his head, insisting that bringing him was already enough, and that anything he wanted he would pay for himself.
"You're certainly quite grown up, aren't you Saruhiko?" Kusanagi laughed—only ever using his first name in a selective atmosphere that he somehow always knew was appropriate—or dare he admit, a little needed. Frowning all over again, the familiar echo of Kusanagi's dialect dragged the downward angle of his mouth to the floor, spinning slowly in his seat, ashamed like a child who'd broken something precious and blamed someone else. You should never have said such nice things to me, he thought involuntarily, you should have never trusted me…his crestfallen face composed uneasily in equal parts of petulance and discomfort, deeply saddened by the disconnect from the only man who'd ever felt like a father to him—call it daddy issues or whatever you'd like—but it was something special Fushimi had never received from his own. The attention, the subtle comments and things he noticed—little things only a parent would bother to compliment or encourage. And so learning of Kusanagi's hopes of having him succeed him once he'd already made his descent over to Scepter 4 probably pained him the most, never quite able to look him in the eye again after that. Even when the warmth still shown nostalgically in the gentlemen's eyes, there was also the sincerity of true sadness that Fushimi had left them. But just like a parent would, he never scolded or ridiculed or branded him a traitor like all the rest, simply sat back and allowed him to forge his own path; with a smile, that although downcast, wanted what was best for him, despite not agreeing with the way he went about it. One day he'd apologize, Fushimi decided, somehow…
And then lastly, but farthest from least, there was Mr. Totsuka—a queer man with even queerer tastes, and a big mouth that Fushimi wouldn't have minded if he'd kept closed and to himself more often. Especially when it came to announcing certain details, theories, and observations that were never anything short of strictly personal and not meant for the ears of others. Embarrassing him insufferably. But to Fushimi, Totsuka would always remain that "sunny spot" that sheltered him from the inferno, almost as if to say, even weeks before his initiation into Homra, that not everyone felt the same within the flames. That the sun also rises. That there could be something else. That he had no reason to hide amidst an environment that felt like enveloping darkness. That everything would work out in the end…he almost teared up thinking about it when he'd first received the news. Right there in the middle of Scepter 4, fingers going foreign against his keyboard, Lt. Awashima's instructions no more than subtitles in a silent film he feared to face long enough to read.
Having briefly excused himself from his station and walked down the halls, past the other Blues, with no trace of expression or reason to rouse suspicion until he'd finally collapsed in an alleyway a few blocks away and begun to cry. A mix of sadness, anger, guilt, and regret all pouring down and soaking into the concrete in a deluge of confliction; a thousand thoughts that spiraled and yet couldn't catch a moments peace to take on the proper shapes, unable to locate the most basic elements, as if his insides were a card catalogue that someone had dumped on the ground. So many titles, genres, and interpretations no longer at his disposal, no quelling the burning, no false comforts behind which to hide. Just a kaleidoscope shifting from one incomplete image to the next, blackened stained glass comprised of deep set shades, charcoal, midnight, and rich scarlet percolating through this nightmarish permanence, unable to cope with the finality of it all; but mostly the fact that the last time he'd seen him, he'd been on opposing sides—a turncoat—a traitor—treasonous scum.
"Don't sweat it…" he cringed, pulling himself back in the direction of his desk, wheels creaking beneath his seat while his thoughts softly corrected, even if Totsuka didn't think that way, it doesn't change what I was, it doesn't change what I did, and now he's gone. I can't change a damn thing, I couldn't even say goodbye, reluctantly pressing his hand to his mouth, he wondered what expression he'd left Totsuka with, what heartless wretched smirk had been stitched across his face as the man watched from afar. How cruel and unusual karma was painting him when there was no dissuading that his final impression had been lasting, eternally, the ugliest side of a two faced coin. I wish they'd shot me instead, he grimaced, at least that way all he'd of seen was the casket creak and close, a pristine mahogany finish and the few people pretending to care. Anything would have been better than the truth. Than the enemy throwing daggers, from his mouth and through his fingertips, aimed at the target that had once taken him in, making a complete mockery of the pivotal milestone that made him who he was today. Not that that was favorable. But without the red there would have been no blue, and without blue, there'd still have been Totsuka. No rain to extinguish the flames. No reason for this awful twisting leftover in his chest he couldn't will away.
No matter how wasted the effort, no matter how futile and barren these attempts to contemplate the past, knowing he'd cast any shadow over that sunny spot, even for a second, and could never take it back still ate away at him. The fact he couldn't show his face at the funeral, even if he'd wanted to, killing him completely. His final memories, the lasting images imprinted upon his brain being the sound of gunfire, the collision of a body against concrete, the blood, the almost inaudible breathes that couldn't breathe anymore. Slow, wheezy lungs filling with fluid and growing gradually scarce, more stunted, less frequent. All light extinguishing as Fushimi was forced to watch the smug expression and earsplitting voice of the man who murdered him talking over the sound of Totsuka dying—slowly, painfully. Entirely alone.
And then five more shots.
BANG.BANG.BANG.BANG.BANG
Fushimi had thrown up the first time he'd seen it. To shoot him was unforgivable enough, but overkill on an already dying man was something that boiled his blood so hot it brought the vibrancy of the Homra insignia beneath his collarbone back to life, so much so, it shown through his shirt. Totsuka wasn't supposed to die...not the sun…it was him who was supposed to crash into us, to grown 15 billion years old and reinvent the world, changing forever; aye, it'd indeed disappeared, died out, and disfigured everything, that much was true, just in the last way he never imagined.
I always told him not to go around that area after dark, he grew angry, this bipolar bypassing of emotions and his stupid self for allowing any of them to surface, but still, if only I'd still been there…he couldn't abandon or override their persistency to move on their own accord, I'm certain he'd of dragged me with, I know it, even just to irritate me—insisting I was much more knowledgeable when it came to technology—as if the camera weren't so old and out of Fushimi's expertise…
He shook his head, the look in his eyes impossible to hide, three ghosting images so important, but so indicative of something else. Someone else. Someone far more dead and far more important than to have been murdered on a mere whim; someone who could've befriended every Tom, Dick, and Harry and never thrown him through such hoops he'd gone to great lengths trying to ignore.
But it wasn't his former friend's socializing that shifted, it was his alliance, his attention, his obsession with Mikoto that made Fushimi feel obsolete and second rate. No longer worthy of praise. And he didn't care that he'd switched sides when it was the other boy who'd abandoned him long before that—it was a different sort of betrayal, but to Fushimi, it was far more severe—it severed the only connection he'd had to sever—and in the end, it was no longer salvageable. He thought…maybe…had hoped, that by separating, he would put things into perspective. That he'd understand this was Fushimi's way of trying to save them. By removing himself from the cause of his mood swings, assuming it was only logical they could go back to the way it was before if Fushimi could only go back to being himself; that time apart would bring something they'd been losing back to their time together—some added value—a rekindled fondness and ability to communicate.
He'd never been more wrong. Not in his whole life. And it wasn't only his friend at fault. He'd gone mad, an emotional floodgate crashing down against such an extreme build up of pressure—ultimately wanting him to hurt the way he did if those damn gold flecked eyes looked through him one more time without fessing up to the fact they were dying, the fact he was sinking so very fast and hadn't the faintest idea how to swim. When he still couldn't acknowledge what his own, 'oh so beloved' King could see from a thick cloud of smoke away without lifting a goddamn finger.
Growing restless and equally irritated, he broke composure in order to slump his whole upper body over the desk. Arms immediately folding, head tilted to one side, fingering the glasses from his face. As if poor eye sight could ever displace the shapes and shifts of shades morphing in and out of a symmetry he knew better than he knew himself. The shadow that had never stopped following him that he silently searched for—turned towards, expecting to still be standing by his side, no matter how much time had passed. Having practically been such apart of his own that he'd never quite learned how to separate them. How to let go of what was already gone. What he'd let go, but so very clearly failed. Never more than a fleeting memory away. Quick, carefree, and crashing against the concrete like he was made for it. Probably because he was, was born to battle and brave the bullshit they'd clung to so desperately once and tried to call "theirs." An empty place lost in time in which they thought they had total control, chasing fantasies like the future was so far away, the air of nostalgia that belonged to that place and that place alone.
"Maybe, if we…" he sounded as if he was murmuring to himself, repeating ancient dialogue in his head that he'd thought long escaped him by now, "…had gotten onto it," inhaling deeply, "would something have changed?"
A question he'd never stopped asking himself since this descent into madness had begun. Returning to that moment over and over in his mind a million times. If only he could hit rewind, pause, then stop time forever—they could have stayed like that, forever—captured like the most candid photograph—eternally preserving the perfect opportunity he'd never have to worry whether or not he'd missed because he'd never know it was gone. All he would know was that the two of them were together, eyes wide and trusting, his own feeling as if they were seeing the world for the first time. So unlike himself, slowly unfolding, cutting his strings, and feeling a closeness he'd never dreamed of or ever wanted before they'd met.
We should have just chased that ship till we disappeared too. Away, far, far away from here, with no kings, no opposing force to challenge and change us.
Just us. That's all I wanted.
But logic was losing out lately to the verdicts of such faulty intelligence, and Fuishimi was falling victim to the fight or flight that never forfeit. That fought persistently till the past came pouring down across his circuit board, frying the internal hard drive he called a heart, and denying him his only defenses. Fuses shorting and algorithms hardly resisting, but that was no excuse, and Fushimi clung to them. His circuits. His strings. Rerouting, rewiring until everything crashed. Every and all systems failing, flailing and gasping to grab hold of a safety net he'd slit to pieces then set on fire.
"I tried to hold on…"
Thick rimmed glasses shielded pale, aquamarine eyes like decretive lenses, but behind which he could no longer hide. Eyes and expression falling over the quote in agony—pained features assessing these things called words he'd once denounced and rejected as naive, immature sounds people strung into meaningless, undeniable excuses, and cringing at their sudden accuracy.
"...I tried so hard."
Nimble fingers furrowing tightly into midnight tresses as his stomach tensed with the forward motion of his face falling against the sheet of foreign sentiment. Teeth clenched and eyes that burned, hot and wet, without any understanding what it meant to cry. All red and reflective, fracturing like broken glass, but too frozen, too solid to possibly weep.
"How many times does he have to bury me before he realizes I'm running out of bones to break," Fushimi cursed, so emotionally uncharacteristic that for a fraction of a second he half expected to see his Father.
That wretched mirror like murder effect of a face that fixedly transmuted all its features onto his own. The one semblance of something passed down from the previous generation, the impersonal image of the man who had never once considered him his son. The inescapable impression of wide, bright blue eyes extinguishing and falling austerely to the ground while the person who was supposed to love him most simply smiled; the twisted sensation of knowing that he too had witnessed the sight of someone's world shattering so similarly to his own once and laughed. He cried and I laughed, something akin to emotional seasickness washing over him and refusing to subside, nauseous at the idea of the interposing imagery of an apple that hadn't fallen from the tree at all but exchanged places with it, assuming an identity he'd never asked for.
The evidence he wished with every fiber of his being could be burned away, or omitted from memory. The single prevailing truth that he had become his father—astonishing brilliance that was constantly overshadowed by the looming void that was reserved for ridicule and reveled in its restriction. Suffocating any sentiment from such a handsome face by stealing all its color, blending and blurring the basic pallets into something twisted and complex that he'd been trying to untangle since he was six. Like his own face had faded into another's overtime until the plasma congealed into plastic so different than the kind he'd once chosen, and the world had fractured it into ever changing tiles. A Rubik's cube with no corresponding color pattern, every block having only ever been a superficial sticker that weathered and wore away until each and every space was completely blank, spinning and shifting to no avail. A defective design that could never be solved. That didn't belong anywhere. Having jumped from color to color, out of certainty and into shades, voided indistinguishable patterns.
When the pieces to the so called puzzle that was his personality were shallow and utterly see through. The insincerity was overwhelming, the obsolescence even worse. No matter how much effort, skill, pure genius, or even time spent could ever create a bigger picture. There was nothing to protect and nothing to save—no real opportunity to ever create or be cared for. No eye to capture where there was only emptiness and endless indecision. Not the faintest trace of gold staring back eagerly or angrily or able to pull all the answers effortlessly off his face.
How was he expected to express what was never there to begin with, that had never even existed? To communicate…to confront when he was conditioned to flippancy and flight? Seeing in black and white was magnetic, but our polarity has always been shades of gray, the Rubik's cube with no discernible solution, we were practically begging for a head on collision, and we've been estranged ever since. It's been so long…he trailed off hesitantly…it was easy to pretend it never happened because we tried our hardest to cover it up, with rivaling colors and contrary collisions, but we were constantly connected, and catastrophe was, and always will be, our catalyst.
Set into motion before cassette tapes became compact discs, but got misplaced somewhere in the conversion—like lyrics to a song we forgot, there was no sound to transcribe or translate the rest into words. We lost time and the world changed, it was that simple, but why rewind and fast forward over something we could skip entirely? Was it not like that from the very beginning? Wasn't it so like them to dance through conversation rather than allowing one to take place? Like a self-destructing dichotomy set to music, they craved constant static. Keys to strike and notes to hit, nothing as parlous and precarious as lyrics, coined to be catchy and less convoluted than actual emotion, they were misleading and lethal and most of them lies. And he was absolutely terrified of them.
Words were disruptive, words were invasive, and words left scars.
Fingertips floated, phantom like, to the space beneath his collarbone, like a metaphorical leash that had been secured, surrendered, but never successfully removed. The intertwining, intricate swirl that lay behind four risen bars of skin. All jagged and protruding like a self fashioned prison. Mutilated and maimed, and still not man enough to admit he missed it. The one and only mirror image he didn't mind so much. The matching piece to the only corresponding set he'd ever had. The only list of words he could never take back because they'd never been spoken—the reciprocations his ears were never again met with because he'd cut them all short.
The shadow that had followed in his footsteps until the shades and silhouettes shifted in and out of one another, morphing into a sanctuary they could share. The safety of their secrecy. Their stupidity, their star-crossed, fated, perfect, piece of shit life, of the world they'd forged and fused into a shared skin. So content with having no one else, so effortless to get lost in one another with no concern for the reality that waited for them on the other side. The kind of sappy, misconstrued storyline Fushimi abhorred, but never stopped slipping into. The only place he'd ever felt secure. Until it too had been pushed and pulled and pulverized into smithereens. Still frames and unspoken I'm sorry's that lay strewn about his feet in shards.
His joints twitched, fingers flexing and inching in such routine motion, stroking the mark he'd once declared a curse as delicately as one would caress an irreplaceable face, a sort of subconscious affection that swept over him years after he'd stepped carelessly over those remains. Fingers transitioning into claws, like throwing knives had replaced his fingernails, burrowing so deeply that he actually drew blood. Red. Like magma—molten—manifesting and melting into the pristine blue turncoat like the traitorous murderer he was, finally his turn to bleed, losing elasticity; the ability to rebound when stretched too far, skin spread so thin, intensifying the extent of damage. And he'd long since ripped his off, hanging it in a closet of skeletons it no longer fit—he doubted now more than ever if it ever really had. Overwhelmed with cowardice, convinced he was incapable of fitting into even himself at this point. Even after getting half way there, his words drifted and disappeared like ripples in a pond, never quite confident enough to retain any form of permanence.
"Quitting is just like you…" Aya's words echoed out of nothingness, too accurate to even infuriate him—how pitiful.
That fucking mark he tsk'd, too forced to be effective this time, quickly losing momentum in the downward motion that drew him to his knees, as if gravity too were against him, dragging him down to the level he belonged.
That FUCKING mark.
That, that fucking mistake.
That goddamn empty space.
"Saruhiko…"
He cringed. That sound.
That voice.
That only exception
….you're amazing!"
that he never missed in so many words.
"Misaki."
Hope that wasn't too bad :) I'll wait a bit to see if anyone bites before deciding to post the next part, taking some more time to smooth out the dialogue transitions. Reviews are appreciated, and again, let me know if the RVW-4-RVW (review for review) is something you're interested in, and designate which, if any, of your fics you would like said review to be for. Thanks again for reading! Until next time. Hopefully?