Author's Note: Why do I even bother writing this you guys all know I'm trash at deadlines
Taishi Fura doesn't like Arima's parenting style very much.
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The Ghoul Lullaby
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caroandlyn
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14
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Fura's always known that Arima's slightly bent in the head, by conventional norms. Well, actually, what he means by that is dropped on the head as a baby and kicked a few times for good measure and then set on fire. Yeah, killing a teenage girl without batting an eye, even if she was a ghoul, wasn't something that normal people would be able to do, let alone at the age of sixteen. Arima's an emotionally stunted sociopath in the making, and somehow he's managed to find a woman who actually likes that quality in a man.
Fura wouldn't peg Mado Akira as someone who does the whole office romance thing, let alone with someone like Arima. She seems like a sensible girl, the rare kind of composed, professional investigator that's practically guaranteed to be promoted to First Class Investigator soon. She'd probably be the last person he'd imagine taking maternity break at such a young age (not yet twenty and not even old enough to drink—what was Arima thinking?), and this could potentially ruin her entire career, if she throws away her quinque to become a housewife.
For the sake of posterity, however, he sends the couple a bottle of sake wishing them the best, and swallows down all the doubts he's been spouting about this relationship. This might work out, who knows. Maybe Arima's working on the whole emotionless ice-guy persona.
And then somehow Arima Ken (officially Kaneki Ken, although who's asking?) is born, and ok, somehow he's turned out pretty decent looking, with a shock of dark blue hair and large grey eyes like his father. He has his mother's face too, the soft curves of Akira's cheeks prominent in the lines of his face and the same tiny worry lines creasing between his eyebrows when he babbles. Fura isn't really one for babies, but even he admits that Ken's a cute kid. He'll be devastating when he's older, just wait.
Ken grows up with a relatively normal childhood, if running around a place filled with potentially life-threatening weapons counts as normal. He's a lively kid, someone who chases after spiders and beetles in the dark corners of file cabinets but isn't too much trouble to watch over. He's got all the junior investigators wrapped around his finger, and on his way to charming the rest of the senior investigators. Heaven knows Hirako is obsessed over the kid already.
And then one day Ken comes to CCG headquarters, and something isn't right.
He's probably around six or seven, if Fura remembers correctly, although by the way he was acting you'd think he was much older. He has that same shell-shocked expression that all the witnesses do when they see the brutality of ghouls, and immediately Fura thinks to himself, oh god what have those idiot parents done. It's bad enough to see the expression of a grown woman realize her husband wanted to cannibalize her alive, it's somehow even worse when there's a seven-year-old looking with around with fear and apprehension towards the people who practically changed his diapers.
"This isn't right," he tells Arima over coffee, and thinks of his own little girl Natsu at home. He looks at the quiet way Ken hangs around in the corner of his office, not talking to anyone, fingers clasped together as if in silent prayer.
Arima looks at him under hooded eyelids, not talking, and it's frustrating at how complex and unreadable his expression is.
Somehow, things get worse. There are little bruises here and there now, bandages that poke under from clothes, a small limp when the boy walks. There's even talk of Arima bringing him on missions, and if that weren't terrifying enough, it's Arima's usual fare of S and SS-ranked ghouls.
"What are you doing?" he asks Akira one day. Hopefully she'll be a little more receptive than her husband to talk with, although, going by the rumors, she's almost as cold-hearted as Arima regarding their son. He still remembers the cheerful little girl First Class Mado had brought to work sometimes almost a decade and a half ago. The comparison is disconcerting.
Akira laughs, almost in his face although she's too polite for that. She's barely twenty-six, one of the youngest Associate Special Classes in history but somehow her eyes are old. "I'm teaching him," she says, "how to survive."
There's a flash of regret, he notices, that flashes through her face when she finishes.
Fura tries to imagine an alternate reality where Ken is seven years old and smiling, chubby-cheeked and alive instead of this sullen, withdrawn boy that stares at him with empty eyes.
"But is it worth it?" Fura responds, and watches her stiffen at his words.
She doesn't respond.