Baby sis didn't have any powers.
She had an aura, a red one like his, but she didn't have any powers to go with it. That was fine. She was a baby and babies didn't have powers. Well big sis had been born with her powers…but she was the Prodigy. She had been born with her powers and she was the strongest in all of Claw aside from dad. Sho…he was the Awakened Child. He had been born with an aura, dad had said so, but no powers. As he got older he could sometimes move stuff without touching it and other stuff like that….but not that often and not as well as big sis. That was why he was the Awakened Child. He'd gone into an Awakening machine when he had been little and then he had come out with powers….and scars….
Scars that baby sis would never have.
"Sho do! Sho do!" shouted baby sis as she tugged on his jacket. She wanted him to do…something. He didn't know. She didn't know a lot of words. She was just tugging on his jacket and….well it was too big. He tugged it back up. She had seen his scars before but she might not have been able to remember them. She might not have been able to remember them and…and that was the one thing about him that he hoped that she forgot about. She lived in the Seventh Division and her mom was a Scar, so she knew what they were, but she could never know what his were.
Where he had gotten them from.
"Sho! Sho do!" shouted baby sis. Her aura was showing now, her little baby aura, her red little baby aura. His aura had been there since as long as he could remember. Hers had been with her, probably, since the day that she was born. He was an esper, a powerful one, like the upper echelon. She might have wound up being a powerful esper too. He didn't know. He didn't know if she would be a powerful esper or even an esper at all….
Having an aura didn't mean, really, that she had any powers.
He had been born with an aura like she was born with anything more than her aura. There was no guarantee that she would have any kinds of powers at all. Sho had taken too long to get his powers, and maybe he never would have gotten his powers, so he'd had to have gone into the Awakening Machine and….and baby sis could not know about that. This place had an Awakening Lab but that was in the basement. Baby sis lived near the top floor. She didn't know that there even was a basement. She wasn't allowed to leave this room on her own, she was too little, and…and her mom loved her and she would never put Mukai into one of those machines…..
Sho wouldn't let her.
"What do you want me to do?" asked Sho as baby sis tugged on him. She was so perfect, the most perfect, and she didn't need to be put into one of those machines. She may not have had her powers and…and her mom wasn't going to make her feel bad about having powers. Moms weren't like that. Moms loved you for who you were, like big sisters, but not like dads. Dads didn't love you for who you were, they loved you for who you were going to be, who they decided that you had to become…
Sho wasn't going to be like that.
When Sho become someone's dad he was going to love his kids no matter what. He was going to love them if they had all the powers or none of the powers or if they were….like him….or if….well there was nothing that could ever make him treat his kids the way dad treated him. He wasn't going to put them in an Awakening Machine and….and also when they grew up he wasn't going to tell them all the time that they had to go and make more people named Suzuki just because the world needed more people named Suzuki….even though was Japan and there were a bunch of people called Suzuki….but it wasn't enough for there to be more people called Suzuki…
They had to be related to dad.
"Do! Sho now! Sho do now!" said baby sis. Sho wished that he had a translator. She wanted him to do something but he didn't know what….but it must have been very important. Her eyes were all blue and stuff. Well they were always blue but they were doing that thing that his eyes did when the pupils got small and stuff. Dad's eyes did that too. Maybe that was just the way that blue eyed people looked when they were focused. It was harder to tell with brown eyed people. Big sis's eyes were so brown that they were almost black so he had no idea what her eyes really looked like when she focused.
Maybe like mom's had been.
Mom had brown eyes. Her eyes had been brighter than big sis's, a different and brighter shade of brown, and…he couldn't remember what her eyes had looked like when she had been focusing. He had trouble even remembering what shade of brown her eyes had been…but he had pictures of her in his old tablet so he would just check there later and he would stop thinking about mom and he would…he would let baby sis talk to him and drag him away from her tiny table…and whatever else that she wanted to do.
He loved her so much and when you loved someone then you played with them and did whatever they wanted.
"What do you want me to do? You want me to draw?" asked Sho as he picked up a crayon. Baby sis slapped it out of his hand and pointed behind him. Sho turned and saw the pile of her toys. Her dolls and cars and animals and planes and blocks. They had been playing city….well he had been playing city she had been playing Godzilla or something.
"Sho do! Sho do!" said Baby sis. She was tugging on him. He crawled in the direction she was tugging him in. She was little, she couldn't hurt his coat, but she could pull it off. If she pulled it off then he didn't know what he would do. Well put it back on….but then she would have seen his scars…and then she would ask about them or poke them or something….and he didn't know what he would do if that happened.
He would never lie to her.
But he couldn't tell her the truth, either, because she was too little for the truth. She was too little to know what happened here at this Division. How the Awakened became awakened. Sho knew…he knew a lot of things that she could never know. Like how many Awakened died….and how they died…before they became the Awakened. How many of them were useless. How being in those machines didn't even guarantee that you got powers. How she didn't need to be in one of those machines because she just…didn't need to be in there. Even if she didn't have any powers yet….and even if she never did…and even if she ended up with hardly any powers at all…
Baby sis could not know that being in an Awakening Machine was even an option.
"You want to play city again? You want to build with the blocks?" asked Sho as he made one of her blocks float. These were the giant kind that looked like bricks. He and big sis used to build forts and stuff with these when they had been really little, too little for real blocks, and they were fun. Real blocks were more fun…but also harder to stack. They were harder to stack and she…well she was little and…and maybe the next time he saw her she would be big enough for real blocks…
He hoped that he saw her before that.
"Sho! Sho! Sho do!" big sis was laughing and clapping now. She was so happy and her aura was happy…and she was smiling. She was smiling and she was showing her little baby teeth. She looked like she had all of them if you didn't look too closely. He could see that she had most of her front teeth but her back teeth were still coming in. Maybe she would have all of her teeth, not just a few teeth with gaps, by the next time he saw her….
He hoped that he saw her before that time came.
Especially because she could bite hard enough with the few teeth that she already had. She had some teeth, not a lot of them, and they were sharp. She had always been a biter, well she had been a gummer when he had met her, and that was just who she was. When she got older she would stop biting, maybe, he didn't know. He loved her for who she was but also….also he couldn't let her grow up to be the sort of person who bit other people…or was mean. Not that he would ever think of her as mean…
She was a baby, she couldn't help it.
She was a baby and she couldn't help her little baby slap and hits and bites and kicks. She was only a baby and babies weren't old enough to know what they were doing. Just like when he had been a little kid he hadn't known what he had been doing when he had hit big sis….no. That wasn't fair. He knew that he had been trying to hurt her but….but he hadn't known any better than to be a jerk….because he had thought that his feelings were the only feelings that mattered….but he was older now and he knew better. He knew better and baby sis didn't know better.
She didn't know better than to stop tugging on his coat.
She was laughing and tugging on his coat as he built their city back up with his powers. She was pointing with one hand and tugging on the collar of his shirt with the other hand. She reached up and took her hand off of his coat…but that was sort of a stupid thing to do because now she was tugging on his hair…and she was strong. She was strong and also her little baby nails were still as sharp as they had been when he had met her. Her nails were digging into his head and her fingers were pulling at his hair and…
And she was just a baby and she didn't know any better.
"Hey, come on. Be Godzilla in our city, not my hair." Said Sho as he tried to get her hand out of his hair. She had sharp nails and strong fingers but he managed to go, finger by finger, until her had was free. Their city was built and she could have gone over there and went all Godzilla all on their city and not his hair…but she didn't seem to want to. She was banging her hand on her little baby art table and stomping her foot…and he had no idea what it was that she even wanted.
"I do! I do!" said baby sis as she banged her hand and stomped her foot. She was…her aura was showing…and he had no idea how to figure out what she wanted. Her mom had stepped out for work stuff, she said that she would be back in an hour and that Sho had to call her if something went wrong, but this did not count as something going wrong. She was just…she wanted something and he had no idea what it was but…but he could figure it out. He was a good big brother and he could figure out what it was that his baby sister wanted.
"Yeah, you can go be Godzilla now baby sis." Said Sho. He picked up her stuffed dinosaur, it was pink but she didn't have a green one so it was ok, and put it on her head. There. Now she even looked like Godzilla…and maybe she wanted to watch Godzilla. The ones in color, not the ones in black and white that had come out when dad had been a kid, baby sis would have liked those. Maybe. He didn't know. She was mostly allowed to only watch educational baby stuff….even though those shows were boring…and if he had been in charge of her then he would have let her watch whatever she wanted…
But he wasn't even her real big brother so, no, he wasn't the one in charge.
"I do! I do now!" said baby sis. Her aura was bright and now she was waving her hands around. Her dinosaur toy fell off of her head. He put it back on and she shook it off. She was waving her hands and stomping her little baby foot….and now her sock was coming off. He reached down and grabbed her foot. She couldn't lose her sock. There was nothing more annoying than losing a sock. Losing a plain black or white sock was annoying because once you lost one then you wound up having an uneven number of socks. Losing a cool sock or a silly sock, her socks were also slippers which made them cool and also they made her feel look like she had pink robot feet which were silly, was the worst because then you couldn't ever wear the other sock ever again.
He got kicked in the face for his trouble.
But he didn't care if she kicked him in the face or not. She was a baby and her little feet didn't hurt at all and even if they did then he wouldn't have gotten mad at her. She was his baby sis after all…his pretend baby sis…and he had been left in charge of her….well in charge of keeping her from hurting herself. She was always trying to do something dangerous. Not now, though, now she was trying to play Godzilla…or something. He didn't really know. The city of blocks was right there, she had her dinosaur toy, so why wasn't she trying to be the baby Godzilla?
He didn't understand her sometimes…but that was ok because he didn't have to understand her to love her.
"Yeah, you can go and be Godzilla now. Go on! Have fun!" said Sho. He pointed over towards the city of blocks and dolls and animals and cars. The city of baby toys. The city of baby toys was right there and she had nothing stopping her from being the baby Godzilla. She wanted to be. She was pointing towards the city just like she was. She was pointing and her aura was flaring. She had kind of a bright aura now. That was good….no. He was thinking about this the way that dad would have thought about it. Her aura was her aura. She had an aura and the fact that she even had an aura was go-it was a thing. Her aura was her aura and it was a part of her. She had red hair, blue eyes, and a red aura. Her aura was just another part of her and it wasn't good or bad. Her aura just was.
"I do now! Now!" said baby sis. She was pointing and she was making her aura flare and…and he made his aura flare. She did the same. He pulled his aura in close. She did the same. She was copying him…like they were playing Simon Says…a game of Simon Says that he hadn't even known that they had been playing….that he hadn't even known that she had been wanting to play…a game that he hadn't even known that she could play…
She was getting bigger….and so were her powers….and that was ok…
She was an esper. She was an esper and she was….well she was a person with an aura and…and he loved her. He loved her if she had powers, if she didn't have powers, if she had baby powers, if she was more powerful than him, if she….if there were ifs that he had never even thought about. He didn't know. All he knew was that he had found himself in a game of Simon Says…and he was Simon…and she was trying her best to win….
She didn't have to try to win…or even to play the game.
"Mukai…are you trying to…use your powers?" asked Sho. She was…he knew that she was but…but maybe she was trying to do something else. Maybe she was just….being a baby. Maybe she was just being a baby and just…not knowing what it was that she was even doing. Yeah. Sort of like how she hit him and kicked and also did other things like eat her boogers or throw her baby mush all over the kitchen or hide her sippy cup behind the couch where she couldn't reach….
She was just a baby and she didn't always know what she was doing.
"I do! I do!" said baby sis. Her aura was flaring and…and she was trying…but maybe she just didn't know what she was doing or…or something. She didn't need to worry about having powers….she was perfect the way she was. She was the most perfect baby who ever had been a baby and….and she was not him. She was nothing like him. She had been born right.
She needed to know that she had been born right.
"Are you trying to use your powers? Because…because you shouldn't. You don't need powers. You don't need powers because you….you're perfect just the way that you are, baby sis. Do you know that? That you're a good baby sis? And that you don't need to use your powers or even have them?" asked Sho. He wished that he had some kind of Sho to Mukai translator app or something. She was still trying and…and she didn't have to. She didn't have to sit there day after day thinking that she had been born wrong and…well she didn't have a big sister but…but she was going to grow up here at this Division completely surrounded by espers…and she didn't need to think that she had been born wrong and that everyone else had been born right. She didn't need that kind of thing inside of her head.
"I do! I do Sho!" said baby sis. No…no. She did not need to have powers like him and…and she did not need to be like him. He hoped that she never, ever, ever thought like that again. That she needed to be like him. She just…he felt cold. She felt…her aura felt…he felt cold. She was….he used to be little and…and when he had been little big sis…he remembered that he had been so little and dad and big sis…they had been playing with…well they had been tossing something back and forth in the yard with dad….with powers…and he had wanted to play too and then….
And then dad had called him tiresome.
Dad had called him tiresome and then…and then the next thing that he remembered was his head hurting a lot…and his head hurt now. Not like a headache but…but like he had…been hit by something and….and the only thing that had hit him was little baby sis's little baby fist and…and he was…he was big now. He was big and he had powers and…and he was cold. He was wearing a coat but also…also the coat did nothing and he was cold…but also sweaty…..like his brain didn't get the message that he was too hot…too hot and too cold and…
And his head hurt…his whole body hurt…
"Baby sis….Mukai…you don't have to do that…" said Sho. He took deep breaths and tried to count in his head. He tried…he did his best. He did his best to count and…and to remember how to breathe and…and that he needed to decide if he was hot or cold and…and now his aura was trying to turn into a barrier. He was trying to make a barrier and…and he was trying to stop himself and….and baby sis…she was copying him. She was making her aura bright and…and she didn't have to do that…because she was baby sis and….and she was good and….and she had been born right. She had been born right and everyone else in the whole world had been born right and baby sis….she could tell that he had been born wrong….and she should not have been trying to be like him. She was…she was baby sis and she had been born right and he had been born wrong…
And she should not have been trying to be like him.
'I do! I do Sho!" shouted baby sis. She was trying to be like him and…and she wouldn't stop. She was going to…to be like him and….and his head hurt and…and his hair was….it was sticking to his head and…and his head hurt and….and his whole body hurt. He felt…up and down his arms he felt needles and…and his back…his whole body felt like….like fire and then…and then he was trying to twitch and…and he had twitched for so long and….and he hadn't even tried to and…and she didn't…Mukai didn't…
She didn't need to be like him.
"No! Stop it!" said Sho. He hadn't meant to yell at her…but he had and…and she cried and…and now she was running away. He watched her run away. He watched her run over to the couch and he watched…she was trying to hide…she was trying to hide from him and…and he had done that to her. He had messed up. He had messed up and now…now she was looking at him like….
She was looking at him like he was dad.
He made a fist and before he knew what he had been even starting to do he was hitting himself. He had done it twice before he stopped himself. He…he had promised big sis that he would never hit himself again but also…also he just…he had promised baby sis that he would be a good big brother to her and…and he needed to be better. He needed to be better and he needed…he needed to…to make this right with her…
If that was even possible.
He tried not to cry. She was still trying to be behind the couch and…and he…he didn't know what to do. He knew that he shouldn't go near her. When he was scared, when he had been little, he had always hated it when mom had tried getting him out of his hiding place. After dad had yelled at him or punished him mom would…she would find him and tell him to come out and….she would tell him that she was sorry that dad had gotten mad at him and that…that he should have been more careful not to make dad mad because…because he knew how dad was. How dad had been…for as long as he could remember. How he had decided years ago that he never wanted to be. He never wanted his kids to be like him. To be scared of him. To look at him the same way that he looked at dad and…
And baby sis was looking at him like that.
"I-I'm sorry…..please come out….I'm sorry…..so sorry…" said Sho. He wiped his tears. She poked her head up. She was looking at him now. He smiled at her as best as he could...but he didn't want to smile. He had been trusted with her and…and he had made promises to her…and then he had yelled at her. She was just a baby and she didn't even know, probably, how upset he was and…and that him being upset had nothing to do with her.
So he had to tell her.
Dad….mom had said that dad punished him because that was how his parents had treated him and…and that he didn't have a lot of patience. He had a lot to do and a lot on his mind and….and that he was just the way that he was and…and that Sho needed to just stop being the way he was, stop bothering dad and doing bad things, so that he wouldn't get punished…and he wouldn't…he would never treat his own baby sister that way…or his own kids…or his own pretend baby sister…or anyone.
He was not dad.
"Mukai….I got upset but…but not with you. I could never be upset with you. I just…when you were trying to use your powers it made me sad." Said Sho. Mukai covered her eyes and then took her hands away. He tried to smile but it didn't reach his eyes and…and she tried again. She took a couple steps forward and tried again. She was playing peekaboo, no, not Simon Says….and he would play whatever she wanted to play. He did the same thing, she was Simon and she said play peekaboo, and as he did it then she did it too….
She took another step forward.
"I love you a lot and I'm sorry about how I treated you. I shouldn't have yelled at you…especially not because I got scared." Said Sho. She was in front of him now and she was covering her eyes. She was trying to walk with her eyes covered. He reached over with his hand, not his powers, and steadied her. He expected her to be afraid, he regretted reaching for her as soon as he did, but she wasn't scared. She threw herself into his arms.
And she smiled.
He tried to smile back down at her. She was there and…and she didn't seem too scared but….but he had been the same way when he had been little. He had gone back to dad afterwards….and he had been like dad. He had yelled at her and…and he hadn't hit her. He would exorcise himself like a spirit if he ever hit her. She was his baby sis and…and he would never do anything to hurt her. Ever.
He would die first.
"I should never have yelled at you and…and I know that it's not an excuse but….but I get sad sometimes. Sometimes I get so sad and so mad and just…and sometimes I get hut without there being anything wrong with me…and it's not an excuse but just…you don't have to forgive me. If you don't forgive me then that's…that's ok. My dad…he yells at me too and….and I never want you to feel the way my dad makes me feel. Ok? I never want to make you mad or…or sad." Said Sho. Baby sis took her hands off of her eyes and then put them over his. He could see through the spaces in her fingers. She was focusing on him. Her eyes were focused and her aura was focused and she was staring at him…and he stared right back.
"Sho sad." Said baby sis. She said that and then she took her hands off of his eyes. She put her arms around him as best as she could, she had short little baby arms, and…..and she was right. He was sad. He was sad all the time, it felt like, he was sad and….and sometimes he felt happy but…but sometimes he felt like one of those fancy Valentine's Day chocolates that they sold in the fancy boxes. He had feelings, which were the outside, but on the inside he had a core of sadness and….
And baby Mukai needed to have a happiness core inside of her…she needed to not be like him….she needed to be better than he could ever be.
"Yeah…but you make me happy and…and I love you. Ok? I was a real fucking asshole back there and-fuck! Just….don't ever say that. Don't say fuck, ok? It's a bad word and you're too little to say that. Ok? Do you promise that you won't ever say fuck?" asked Sho. Nope. She was not allowed to curse. If her mom heard her cursing then…then he could just….well he could kiss all of his baby sis visits goodbye so….so he just…he prayed to whatever God that was out there that she never learned how to say fuck.
"Truck." Said baby sis. Sho smiled. That was…it was close but not so bad. Good. He would still be allowed to see her…and she would still want to see him. She was smiling and she had her finger in her nose…and that was fine. Just so long as she wasn't scared of him. Just so long as she wasn't going to ever look at him like that, like he was dad, because…because he never wanted anyone to look at him like that.
"Ok…that's good. Just don't say fuck….that's all I ask." Said Sho. He took both of her hands in his. She took her hands away and slapped him on both cheeks.
"Duck." Said baby sis. He didn't know if she was telling him to duck or if she had figured out how rhymes worked….or if she was trying to get as close to fuck as she could without actually saying it…but he wasn't going to let her get to fuck because…well they could have cursing matches when she was his age and he was older.
"Yeah…um…let's play city! Yeah…let's just….let's both be Godzilla, ok? I can be big brother Godzilla and you can be baby sis Godzilla…how's that sound?" asked Sho. There. They weren't upset, well he wasn't, and she had probably forgotten about what had happened. She was just a baby after all and her memory wasn't the best. He got up onto his knees so they were still about the same height and he started to walk her over to their city.
"Sho do. I do." Said baby sis as she held his hand. He was happy and he was happy and…and now they were both happy and…and that was all that he had ever wanted from her…or from another person. He just wanted her to be happy and…and he wanted to be happy, too….and he was happy. He felt happy.
He had a happy coating on the outside…but he had a core of sadness on the inside…but that was ok as long as he never showed baby sis what he was like on the outside.
"Yeah. You do….and I do too." Said Sho. He knocked down a building. Baby sis knocked down another one. That was what they did. They were big brother and little sister and they were playing together and…and they were both Godzillas together and…and he was happy. She was happy too. She was happy and he was going to keep her that way. She didn't have her powers yet, or at all, and that was fine. She just…she had been trying to copy him and….and he wasn't going to show her his powers anymore. Not if it made her want to have powers too.
Sho didn't care if she had powers, just that she was happy.