Strides back a year later an entirely different writer
I want to start with that I am so sorry that I basically abandoned this story for a year. That wasn't my intention at all, but a lot of things happened at that time last year. I started college last year (Go Gators!) and, with COVID, it was harder and more time consuming that I expected. Then when I finally got some free time, I realized that I had fallen out of this fandom. At the start of this year, I wrote a longfic for Initial D (I'm posting it this Sunday if you want to go and check it out) and resolved to update this as well.
I'm going to be completely honest, I'm not entirely back into this fandom. The story is finished and I'm going to edit it completely, but I'm not going to change any major plot points. So hopefully you'll enjoy what I had in mind when writing this last year!
Brief summary: Akira has been trapped in a time loop, repeating his second high school year over and over again. He can't deviate from the predetermined path or the run will end. But the longer he goes, the more freedom he seems to gain. But he's tired of the resets and the cycles. He's done bending to this impossible task.
—
"it's seeing you within every stranger i pass"
Akira loiters around Untouchables, waiting for the store to open for the day. He skipped school and left Morgana with Ann for the afternoon. It doesn't matter what appearances he tries to keep up, the ringing has faded to a dull roar anyways. Maybe he's finally gotten used to it.
Maybe he's finally learned not to care.
The anger still simmers inside of him, bubbling and popping and too volatile for him to touch. He let's it sit there, filling the cavernous emptiness that once resided within him. It's a bit unpleasant but nowhere as deliberating as the apathy.
Iwai steps out of the store, flipping the small sign on the door before looking over to Akira. A small bit of confusion works its way into his expression but he doesn't say anything and gestures for Akira to follow him inside.
Once the door is firmly shut behind them, Iwai turns back to Akira. He rests against the counter, the Hanged Man Arcana humming between them. It wasn't complete yet, but full enough for Iwai to trust him, full enough to get what he wants from him.
"What are you doing here, kid?" Iwai asks, the confusion bleeding into his voice. "Don't you have school today?"
Akira shrugs, knowing that no excuse would be enough to satisfy Iwai. "I need your assistance." He doesn't use the word help. It makes him sound too vulnerable.
"What is it?" Iwai crosses his arms over his chest, fiddling with the lollipop in his mouth.
"I need a gun. A real one." Akira's voice is chilled, a steely determination coating his words.
"What are you trying to do that—" Iwai sweeps a hand around his store to the model guns displayed. "—none of these works?"
Akira's hands start to tremble. He shoves them into his pockets. "There's something I need to do." He needs a real gun because he should be nowhere near the Metaverse if everything goes as planned.
"Hurting people won't get you anywhere." Iwai pulls the lollipop from his mouth and spins the stick in between his fingers. "Trust me."
"I'm not going to hurt anyone." Anything Akira does will be gone as soon as he succumbs to the ringing in his head anyways. No one will be hurt because no one will be around to even remember it.
Iwai watches him, eyes narrowed and gaze harsh. Akira doesn't even flinch. Neither of them move, the only sound filtering through the store is the occasional jolt of the air conditioner turning on.
After a few moments, Iwai sighs and pushes off the counter. "Don't make me regret giving this to you, kid." He steps around the counter and rummages through the drawers. He pulls out a gun and places it on the counter.
Akira reaches over and grabs it, holding it gingerly in his hands. It holds a little more weight than the models. "I won't."
He slips the gun into his bag and takes the offered bullets. "I'm expecting you to return that when you're done." Iwai leans over his counter, a promise hidden in his words.
"I will." Akira calls over his shoulder, letting a thin grin stretch over his face.
It's unfortunate that Akira's never been one to keep his promises.
—
The next few months pass in a blur. Akira's trying to keep the ringing in check, trying to stay as long as he can in this cycle. He still has something he needs to do. Something he needs to test.
The gun is strapped against his ankle, tight and barely visible against his loose-fitting pants. No one has noticed it yet, not even Morgana, who he's certain has brushed up against the ammunition hidden within his bag. Only one bullet rests in his gun, plenty for what he wants to do.
When Akechi finally joins them at the end of October, Akira suspects that he might know. Or at least has a suspicion of it. Akechi's gaze traces over all of them, analyzing their movements and assessing the level of threat each one possesses. Akira has long since balanced his gait, no longer walking awkwardly with the gun strapped to his leg, but he can't remove the slight shift completely.
Akechi picks up on this, whether he consciously acknowledges it or not. His gaze darts down to Akira's feet just a bit too often to be normal, looking for something to explain the small discrepancies in his stride. Akira's hidden the gun well and unless Akechi has experience with concealed carry like this, he doubts that Akechi truly knows what Akira has.
But he'll learn.
He'll learn very soon.
Akira works his way through the days with methodical ease, balancing the infiltration and the steadily growing anticipation building within his chest. Previously he's regarded these days much like any others, with detached disinterest and a vague understanding of what's going due to the endless repetition. Now he's much more attentive.
He has to be careful not to give into the ringing too early, lest ending the run before it could really get started. This is the longest that he's kept up with a deviation, the longest that he's gone without resetting after one.
Part of him, the part that viciously encourages him from the shadows of the remaining emptiness within him, the part that he doesn't quite like to look at any more, wonders how long he could take it. If this was the thing that he needed to break free from the cycle. If it was something that was this easy.
He pushed the thoughts away. He couldn't afford to think like that, not after how far he's gotten. Doubting his previous decisions wouldn't get him anywhere now.
And this is all that he has left.
Akira follows Akechi's lies, sickenly sweet against his tongue. They're tantalizingly bitter and he knows exactly how everyone fell for them. He acts like he doesn't suspect a thing, like he's just a little too innocent, a little too naive to be fighting in this world of adults. Akechi smirks and grins a smile that's too full of teeth when he thinks that no one is looking and Akira knows that everything is falling into place.
The hardest part is the situation after the arrest. Everything follows the same pattern as before, so he's led in with the same whispers of a traitor in their group. As if that could break him. If anything, with the way that he's going rogue with the gun strapped to his ankle, he could be considered a traitor as well.
Luckily they didn't search him thoroughly. Why believe that he'd use normal, human methods when his whole modus operandi is the unnatural? So they leave him with his gun biting into the flesh of his leg as they throw him around the cell. He likes to believe that the pain gets to be more bearable but he often has trouble remembering everything that happens with the drugs coursing through his veins. At first this alarmed him.
Now it's just par for the course. He wishes that he could forget more than a night in the room.
He repeats the past few months in concise, measured pieces to Sae when she struts in, folders in hand. At the start of the cycles he had to restrain himself from blurting out more, from revealing events that have yet to come. It's easier now to just state the facts of the situation, outlining it into the missing parts of the puzzle Sae is trying to put together. It's gotten faster over the times. He hopes that she appreciates it even if she has no way of knowing.
She leaves just as quickly as she arrives, the deal denied and the phone purposely ignored. His friends might worry but he doubts that this world will be around long enough for them to notice that he's gone.
He removes the gun from his ankle and quickly checks to see if the bullet is still in place. It rests snugly in the chamber and Akira pushes it back in. He tucks it into his pocket for easier access and waits.
The door opens with a click, Akechi striding in with a guard just a step behind him. A thin, mockingly innocent smile rests on his face but excitement dances in his eyes, liquid and volatile. Akira just watches impassively as Akechi shoots the guard.
The suppressed shot still rings out, muffled and distorted. Akechi replaces the silencer but before he could aim it at Akira, Akira pulls out his own gun and levels it at his chest—right where his heart was, where the Justice Arcana rested, quivering.
Akechi's are wide in a way that Akira's never seen before, his pupils thin pinpricks against the deep burgandy of his iris. "Where did you get that?" Akechi's voice is small and breathless, trembling. It isn't from the fear of death.
The pounding in his head has risen in a crescendo and the ringing—
He pulls the trigger; the shot rings throughout the room. The gun slips from his grasp and clatters to the table, loud in the silence remaining after. He needs to work quickly before someone comes in to check.
Akira stumbles to his feet, fighting the distinct feeling that he should reset, give into the ringing that he's kept at bay for so long or place the gun to his head himself.
His fingers fumble at Akechi's throat, his flesh pale in the harsh light of the interrogation room. Nothing pulse against them. He leans back, a strange calm falling over him. He gently removes the gun from Akechi's hand and places it into his mouth.
The barrel of the silencer is too long to rest comfortably but it'll have to do. He only left one shot in his gun afterall.
He breathes in and out and pulls the trigger.
Everything is dark and he wonders if he finally ended the cycles, resisting enough for everything to be broken.
—
He's brought back into the next run so fast it gives him whiplash. He collapses against the floor, heaving.
He struggles to breath, the taste of the gun metallic in the back of his throat with the acidic grittiness of gunpowder filling his mouth. Something winds tight around his chest, pressing into his lungs with jagged edges. The anger recedes within him, leaving emptiness that he thought was gone. That he wished was gone.
This was the earliest reset he's ever had.
—
I hope you enjoyed this chapter and it was worth the unreasonably long wait. I don't have any plans of disappearing, especially since I need to post my other story too, but I am also starting my next semester of college classes and a new job. If you want to stay updated, check me out on tumblr!