A|N: setsuno touya's character's intrigued me from day one, especially the way he interacts with his friends and others around him. you could consider this a smaller character study/think piece, but it's more of a practice until i get around to writing a legitimate story for the man. constructive criticism is welcome! happy reading!
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They're not friends. Label's too nice, too cutesy for the type of men they are. Brutal and determined and deadly. Chisaki-sama's little name for the group's starting to make sense nowadays.
Maybe in another life, if things had been different, if they hadn't been shells of who they used to be, they could call themselves friends. Sometimes he entertained it, him and his wife and kid with a steady job where his partners could type their lives away with a little bit of alcoholism as compensation. Not that he was above heavy drinking, especially with how work's worn on him in the past week. Chisaki-sama was weird like that, didn't offer any outings even when Touya was willing to sacrifice his annoyance around crowds for a distraction to soften the edge of life off. His friends deserved a good drink at the very least.
Maybe in another life...but whether he liked it or not they were all in this one. A tormented existence filled with grueling day jobs, unadulterated attacks that could happen at any moment because of anyone, and the lingering feeling of death even outside of anything Chisaki-sama related. He has the occasional suicidal thought, but every time he's faced with the option to keel over Chisaki-sama's words become his blood and he's alive again.
And...it would make his friends sad if he died. At least he hopes so; he prides himself on his ability to read people's faces and words and the like, but he's still stressing his brain to he limits decoding what emotions his friends felt day-to-day. For all he knows, they could be conspiring a plan to kill him themselves!
Not that Tabe-kun had much bark left him in to fight him after all the biting he does during work hours. Neither did Hojo-kun; for a man sculpted like a brick, it was easy to for their enemies to find his weak spot and probe it. Age did that to a person's back, Touya supposes. Age and chronic pain from your boss attempting to murder you.
They aren't friends, but that doesn't stop him from leaping in the way of any hits to protect them. Didn't stop him from teasing them as they patched each other up, laughing at any light jabs pushed in his own way. Wasn't even able to stop his heart from racing in the middle of the night at the thought of losing them, the only people in life he could ever understand. Who understood him back.
They aren't friends. They're practically one whole.