This was written as a gift for EvilMuffins through fandomgiftbox.
The fic ended up a lot bigger than I anticipated, but I had good fun writing it and it's a ship I love a whole bunch too, so I'm not complaining at all. Hope you enjoy!
"Gifts for the Trickster"
The first time Shuuichi chose to spend his free time with Kokichi, he gave him an autumn-coloured scarf as a present.
"Let me guess," Kokichi said, unfolding the thing and weighing it between his hands while looking it over. "You won this from the MonoMono Machine and thought I'd like it 'cos I'm always wearing a scarf, right, Saihara-chan?"
"Ah, something like that," Shuuichi admitted, more easily than he would've liked.
"Hmm..." Once he'd finished checking the gift, Kokichi faked a brief disapproving frown before grinning and tossing it over his shoulder. "Cool! You've got pretty good taste! Still not as good as mine, though!" Even though he said that, he was wrapping his new scarf round his neck over the top of the one he always wore. "So? How's it look?" He turned this way and that to better show it off.
Taking in the sight of the other boy wearing the fluffy pinkish item and how it went with the purple of his eyes and picked out the highlights in his hair, one word immediately came to Shuuichi's mind, but he covered his mouth and stopped himself before he could call Kokichi cute. Mentally scolding himself for being taken in by the charms of this unrepentant liar, he reconsidered what to say. "It... suits you, I guess?"
"You guess?" Kokichi took a step forwards and blinked at him. "Oh, wait," he said with a smile, "you think it's not as cool as my normal scarf, don't you?"
I wasn't thinking anything of the sort, Shuuichi answered in his head, and he would have rolled his eyes as well if he didn't think Kokichi would have made a big crocodile-tears deal out of that. Still, he wondered. "Is that scarf a favourite of yours, then?"
Kokichi broke into another big grin. "Nishishi! It's not just a favourite, it's the ultimate proof of just how goshdarn evil I am!"
This time, Shuuichi did roll his eyes. "That has got to be a lie..."
The alleged supreme leader himself simply giggled some more. "No way, it's totally true!"
Afterwards, Shuuichi learned a little more about Kokichi's secret evil organisation and was threatened for knowing things he never asked to hear about.
xx
He decided that he must not have entirely disliked hanging out with Kokichi, regardless of his threat from before that he couldn't quite believe was serious, because he'd just found that he was willing to interrupt the other boy's so-called strategy meeting with Gonta – no way was he up to anything good, after what he'd said about getting everyone to watch their motive videos – in order to spend his free time with him again.
This time, he'd brought him a pack of rock-paper-scissors cards.
"Ooh, another neat gift!" Kokichi practically snatched it out of Shuuichi's hands as soon as he'd offered it to him. "Card games are great and rock-paper-scissors is great, so this is like the best of both worlds!"
Shuuichi let out a small, nervous laugh and made himself smile a little. "I'm glad you like it?" While he couldn't deny being pleased by Kokichi's enthusiasm for his present, there was something about him even in his childish glee that still kept him slightly on edge. It was a feeling that he was steadily getting accustomed to around this boy, for better or worse.
Kokichi, for his part, had merrily opened the pack and was shuffling through the cards as if they were the trading kind and there was supposed to be the chance of a super rare one in there. "We could have so much fun with this! Imagine a game between us with your life on the line!" After saying that so casually, he raised his finger to his lips and gave Shuuichi a darkly mischievous look. "Wouldn't that be thrilling, Saihara-chan?"
Shuuichi flinched a step backwards despite himself. "D-don't even joke about that! I wouldn't call that fun or thrilling at all!" And why must it only be my life? He cringed inwardly; he'd just known the conversation would go somewhere he didn't like, and he hoped that Kokichi didn't have his threat from last time in mind.
"What if I wasn't joking?" Kokichi's eyes narrowed ominously, causing Shuuichi to gape at him and trip over his next words trying to gauge his real intentions... before he just as abruptly relaxed to an almost bored expression and started putting the cards back in the pack. "Well, not that we're playing with these right now. Normal rock-paper-scissors is way better than a card game version anyway."
At this sudden change in mood, Shuuichi could only stare blankly for a moment while the unease he'd felt fizzled out of him like it had been nothing at all. "Didn't you just say the card game was the best of both worlds?" Kokichi's apparent reversal in his attitude towards it confused him more than anything else.
"I lied, of course." Kokichi said that as if it was the most obvious thing in the world as he pocketed the pack of cards. "Still a cool present, though! Really."
So do you actually like it or not? Shuuichi sighed. He felt that his patience for this boy's antics had reached its limit for the day.
Kokichi had his hands behind his head and was grinning once more, obviously amused by Shuuichi's exasperation. "Nishishi! Now, where were we...?"
After that, Shuuichi found out to his dismay that Kokichi was keeping up his threat from the day before, because he did make him play a game with his life on the line – with a different card set he apparently had on him from the start, at that – and claimed after they tied that he had three events left to live, whatever that meant.
With the matter of the motive videos weighing on his thoughts as it was, he didn't dare overthink Kokichi's words too much, but they remained in the back of his mind nonetheless – as did Kokichi himself.
xx
Between Kokichi's threats, the "meet and greet" incident, and what had happened during and after the second class trial, Shuuichi thought he would have had every right to never even look his way again during his free time – and yet he'd still chosen to seek him out regardless. Somehow, he felt that he just couldn't leave him alone.
He hoped the sukiyaki caramel he'd just won from the MonoMono Machine would be an entertaining enough third present for him.
"What've we got this time?" Kokichi extended both his palms together for Shuuichi to drop the packet into. Once he'd had a good look at what it was, his eyes lit up with excitement, much to Shuuichi's relief. "Whoa, this definitely doesn't look boring! You ever tried it yourself, Saihara-chan?"
Shuuichi shook his head. "I... haven't, and I don't particularly care to, either." He had to admit, mixing together several strong flavours the way this caramel apparently did didn't sound like his idea of an appealing snack at all.
"Eeh? And you're giving it to me anyway?" Kokichi seemed a little disappointed for a moment before he suddenly gasped, as if something had just occurred to him. "Wait, don't tell me... you're using me as a taste tester, aren't you?" His lip trembled slightly.
"That's not-"
"How horrible!" Big wet tears welled up in Kokichi's eyes, which gazed right up into Shuuichi's perplexed ones as though he'd been utterly betrayed by someone he loved. "Making me eat crappy food you don't even want... I can't believe you'd be so mean!" Then he started wailing at the top of his lungs, enough to echo throughout the entire room.
Shuuichi, taken aback by such a wild accusation and outburst, awkwardly held out his hands. "O-Ouma-kun, calm down! I wouldn't dream of using anyone like that!" He knew it had to be as fake as every other time Kokichi cried – or at least he thought he always faked his crying – yet he felt some strange need to try and placate him all the same.
Just as quickly as he'd started, Kokichi stopped as if he'd never shed a single tear in the first place, and he laughed it off like the joke it really was. "'Kay, I'm calm now! And I was lying anyway. I love weird-tasting stuff like this, and there's no way you'd do anything that mean even to me!" He put a teasing finger to his lips. "Or perhaps... especially to me?"
Once again, Shuuichi found himself blindsided. "What... are you talking about?" Do I want to know? After his stunt from just a moment before, he was wary of anything else that came out of Kokichi's mouth now. It's not even like I've given him special treatment... have I?
Kokichi's giggling interrupted his thoughts. "You really don't know, even though you keep hanging out with me and giving me presents no matter what I do? They've all been things I like, too, so you obviously put some thought into it." He stepped into Shuuichi's personal space then, staring up at him with his head tilted curiously to one side. "You sure you haven't taken a shine to me, Saihara-chan?"
Having the other boy's face so close to his all of a sudden flustered Shuuichi even more than he might have been by his words on their own, and he stumbled back a step or two. "Ah, I... it's not wha-"
"Then what is it?" Kokichi asked, folding his hands behind his head and pretending to look innocent.
Shuuichi felt his cheeks burn a little as he gritted his teeth and decided to stand his ground. "Ouma-kun! You're just messing with me now, aren't you?"
Kokichi simply laughed at that. "Welp, you got me there! Though it'd sure be nice if my feelings were mutual!"
Shuuichi groaned, not wanting to rise to any more obvious bait, before he realised that Kokichi hadn't made him play another so-called game yet. As soon as he tried to ask about it, Kokichi suddenly announced a tea party and dragged him to the dining hall for it, lulling him into a false sense of security before declaring it to be a wasted event.
He resented himself for thinking he would've liked to just have tea with him normally.
xx
Damn it, Ouma-kun...
After their last downtime conversation, Shuuichi found himself questioning why he did keep going to see possible reasons came to mind – morbid curiosity being chief among them – but the idea that he might have taken a shine to Kokichi like the other boy had claimed still felt preposterous to him.
Even so, here he was meeting up with him for the fourth time, with a fourth present to offer him, right when he'd just made a tasteless joke about getting Maki to "clean up" Angie's student council. I thought you didn't like Harukawa-san...?
"A milk puzzle!" Kokichi grabbed the white box with both hands and held it before him with his eyes practically sparkling. "Man, I've always wanted to try my hand at one of these! This is something astronauts use for their concentration training or whatever, right?"
"Apparently so," Shuuichi nodded, though he couldn't place why Kokichi would be so interested in that aspect of the gift of all things. "Why are y-"
"Yay!" Kokichi suddenly jumped for joy. "You gave this to me and not Momota-chan!" In unbridled glee, he danced in circles while still holding the puzzle box out in front of him, laughing all the while. "I knew you were my favourite for a reason!"
While one part of Shuuichi felt unable to trust being called Kokichi's favourite and another part of him wanted to take it as a real compliment, he simply sighed at the childish display before him. "What does Momota-kun have to do with this?" Don't tell me you're trying to compete with him over me? He couldn't think of too many other reasons why Kokichi would randomly bring up his friend.
Kokichi spun back to face him, holding the puzzle box to his chest with both arms now. "Nishishi! What do you think?"
Shuuichi opened his mouth to answer him, but then thought better of it. "Actually... never mind." He didn't want to fall into any traps like last time.
An idea came to him a second later – one that he hoped would create an opportunity for him and Kokichi to bond a little more with one another.
"Ah, we could try working on that puzzle together if you like?" He asked it casually enough, and he didn't think even someone like Kokichi – who'd acted like he was being used as a taste tester for the sukiyaki caramel before – could make up a ridiculous ulterior motive from such an innocuous, friendly question.
"Nope, no can do." Kokichi's answer was just as casual and almost immediate.
The blunt rejection caught Shuuichi off guard. "Huh? Why not?"
"I always play games on the highest difficulty, remember?" Kokichi took one of his arms off his present to regard his fingernails, as if he couldn't believe Shuuichi had forgotten something dreadfully important. "That means no getting help from guides or other players or anything, either." He made eye contact with Shuuichi again with a guilty smile, though it felt more like he was just pretending to feel guilty. "So sorry, but even if it's my beloved Saihara-chan, I don't play co-op."
Shuuichi's shoulders sank; he couldn't even bring himself to try and hide his disappointment. That Kokichi could shoot down his offer to do something nice and relaxed together with him, even though he had no problem doing or saying anything he wanted, left him feeling more disheartened than he wanted to admit.
Yet he still calls me his "beloved"... When he'd first been called that, he recalled thinking that it had to be a lie and that Kokichi must have meant the very opposite. Now, however, after having spent so much of his free time at least trying to get to know him better, he felt far less sure that it was a lie – which only made him even more frustrated with the other boy's behaviour. Damn it! If that's how you really feel about me, then why can't you be more honest and let me closer instead of keeping me at this stupid arm's length? Why must you be so difficult?
"Yoohoo! Earth to Saihara-chan!" Kokichi called out to him with his hand around his mouth, snapping him out of his train of thought. "Don't forget we still gotta play a game!"
Shuuichi then had to put up with him suggesting some outlandishly dangerous games before they settled on playing rock-paper-scissors instead, where they tied a hundred times in a row. He idly recalled the rock-paper-scissors card game he'd given him several days ago and wondered if the trick to throwing the same hand on purpose Kokichi had alluded to was a reason why he preferred the real thing.
He also had to wonder why someone who was supposedly going to kill him by the next event would deliberately not play to win – though in his heart of hearts, he thought he probably knew the real reason.
xx
"Is that your final offering to me, Saihara-chan?" Kokichi eyed up the heavy black-and-red book Shuuichi was holding out to him with great interest.
"If... you want to call it that, yes." Shuuichi let the other boy take the gift while mentally reprimanding himself for going to see him yet again, when he knew all too well by now where the conversation would ultimately go; although the greater part of him doubted how serious Kokichi had been with his threats, the smaller part felt like he just hoped he wouldn't try anything so soon after the whole group had just had the third class trial. "I thought you might be interested in case anything your organisation did was in there," he went on to add.
Kokichi checked over the tome a little more before tucking it under his arm. "Hmm, I wonder," he said with an ambiguous smile. Then he looked Shuuichi in the eye again. "Aren't you curious yourself, though?"
"No thanks," Shuuichi replied. "I wouldn't get such a horrible book just for myself." In fact, the so-called Book of the Blackened had left a bad taste in his mouth since the very first time he'd caught sight of it, before he'd even so much as touched the thing; he hadn't read a single page of it, and he decided he'd rather keep it that way.
Even so, his answer didn't seem to have entirely satisfied Kokichi, because now his gaze was piercing right into him, and an eerie grin was spreading right across his face. "Not even the teeniest bit of morbid curiosity as the Ultimate Detective?"
Shuuichi froze in place for a second, realising then that some deep dark recess of his mind he didn't want to acknowledge – one that vaguely thought of the killing game files and racks full of deadly poisons in his talent laboratory – did feel a faint draw to whatever atrocities the book might have detailed; but with a firm shake of his head, he quickly crushed it under his better judgement. "No! I don't want anything to do with that book, so just... take it away when we're done here!"
"Yeah, sure," Kokichi said, his expression relaxing back to normal in an instant. "But you still got it just for me, didn't you?" he added playfully.
"Ah." Shuuichi didn't have a comeback for that; he knew he couldn't deny it, because it was completely true.
Kokichi smirked at him like he'd hit bullseye. "It's an exclusive prize from the casino, right? It's not something you can just get at random from the MonoMono Machine like all your other presents." He had that mischievous finger to his lip again as he continued. "You went out of your way to play games at the casino and spend your hard-earned medals on that creepy old book, just because you knew I'd be totally happy to get it." He proceeded to wipe a tear from the corner of his eye. "Really, I'm so touched! Who knew my beloved Saihara-chan loved me back this much?"
An intense heat spread across Shuuichi's cheeks then, and he found himself unable to look in the other boy's direction anymore; Kokichi had seen right through him this time, and with the way he'd teased him right afterwards, he felt too embarrassed to try arguing back against him at all. Anything I do say will just make him mess with me even more, he reasoned to himself in resignation.
Kokichi giggled at his plight before reminding him that they were indeed going to be playing their final game, whether he liked it or not. This turned out to be a knife game, which Kokichi lost as soon as it started when he managed to nick his own finger; then when Shuuichi tended to his wound, he revealed that he'd wanted to steal his heart and not his life all along.
It was an unbelievable turn of events for Shuuichi, yet somehow, he could believe it. At the back of his mind, he'd always questioned how serious this least trustworthy of liars ever was with his threats towards him, and his doubts had grown all the more when Kokichi had suggested he might have tied on purpose in their rock-paper-scissors session last time. He also couldn't deny that he had constantly thought about all the strange things Kokichi kept saying – to the point where he kept seeking him out regardless of how dangerous he might've been, hoping to get answers and understand him even just a little.
He was drawn to Kokichi, he realised with another blush, enough so that he'd put as much effort as he had into choosing presents that he could be sure the tricky so-called supreme leader would like. I guess Ouma-kun really has stolen my heart, he admitted to himself, placing a hand over his chest. He wasn't lying about that after all.
He thought he heard a kissing sound ahead of him, and when he looked up, he was sure he saw Kokichi taking his bandaged hand away from his mouth – he wondered how much of a coincidence it was that he'd caught his third finger on his left hand with the knife – as he cheerfully skipped off back towards the dorms.
At that, he smiled slightly. No matter how much Kokichi had messed with him, and no matter how difficult and uncooperative he could be, a certain part of him felt assured that he hadn't been lying after all when he'd called him his beloved, and that he did, in fact, have a fond place in the other boy's heart.
All those gifts had been worth it in the end.
Fin.
As always, comments and constructive criticism are both welcome and appreciated.