Fukuda had never had a problem going where he wasn't wanted, not if he was needed.
And he was needed.
"What…happened here?" asked Fukuda as he walked through the door. It wasn't hard to find Suzuki, not if he knew where to look. In times of crisis Suzuki liked to hide. He hated feeling vulnerable more than anything else in the world, and he felt more than vulnerable now. Fukuda knew him. Fukuda had known him for most of his life. Fukuda had been through this with him before.
But this time he had nothing to do with it.
This time she, Missus Suzuki, had left of her own accord. And she had left. Fukuda had looked into it and there wasn't anyone operating in Japan who could have done something like this. Everyone was either paying tribute to Claw, hiding from Claw, or just gone. They had done good work in Japan. The only holdouts were Jodo and the government, and this wasn't either of their MO. Jodo pulled you in with promises of an esper utopia with the only caveat being you had to follow him until the end of time, something familiar, and the government couldn't find their ass with two hands and a map. This woman had left on her own, and Fukuda didn't blame her.
He couldn't think of a worse fate than being Suzuki Touichirou's lover…wife…partner.
Maybe being his best friend. That had been his title for the past three or so decades…though he'd been relieved of it, thanks to her. Saka Shiori. The woman who Touichirou had chosen above him…not that he knew why he cared. The thought of sleeping with him made his skin crawl. It wasn't about that…the time, maybe. He had no idea how long he was going to live for, he still looked a good fifteen or so years younger than he should have, but he had wasted so much of that time on Touichirou…so much of that time building up Claw…only to be cast aside. For her.
And then she'd left.
And here he was. Standing outside the door of the world's most nondescript safehouse. It made him nervous, a bit, being this close to Sapporo…not that he was even sure if Masami had stayed. It wasn't as though he had ever gone looking for her…he could have. It would have been easy. He could have just turned around and…and then what? He didn't even know where he would have begun to look. He didn't know what he would have done if he had found her. He didn't know what he would have done if he had led Touichirou right to her…not that he was still looking…at least he said that he wasn't looking for her. He should have been. She was twice the woman that Shiori was and yet Touichirou still-
Fukuda had no clue what he wanted.
But he knew what he had to do. He tried the door…unlocked. Of course it was. Suzuki had never been good about that, not even when they had been kids. Fukuda used to just be able to let himself right into the Suzuki house whenever he had wanted to…nearly whenever he had wanted to. If his dad's car had been in the driveway. Walking in to to just him, or him and his mom, had been one thing but his dad…Suzuki-san had always been a very high strung man.
Apple. Tree.
He had never taken it well when Suzuki had left the door opened…though he did work hard. He drove himself into the ground for his family, as he had been so fond of saying, and he at least deserved to have a modicum of privacy…he had been the sort of person to really share his emotions when he got angry. Never in the way that Touichirou did, of course, he never took it out on people. Touichirou thought otherwise but, really, there was a difference between getting your anger out through sparring and trying to put your son through a wall…Fukuda balled his fist.
Then he relaxed.
That was neither here nor there. That had been years ago, when they'd been children, and his parents had been alive. Now both of their parents were long dead and mourned. They were the adults now and they had to act like it…he had to act like it. He may have been letting himself in like he was still a child but…but he was the adult now and that meant that he had to make some very adult decisions…for Sho's sake.
It was all for Sho.
He let himself in. He slipped his shoes off in the genkan and frowned. Touichirou's shoes were there, facing the wrong way, and in need of a good polish too. He assumed that the sneakers with the anime characters on them were Hatori's, unless Suzuki had felt like adopting any other grown men while Fukuda had been away. He kicked Hatori's shoes out of the way and stepped out of the genkan. He could feel Suzuki's aura…it felt familiar in a way that he didn't entirely like. It felt like a warm blanket, a favorite sweater, sitting next to a heater…but that was good, wasn't it? If Suzuki was registering as familiar to him then it must have gone the other way around…right?
It couldn't have been over between them.
The sex…he hoped that never happened again…but he was prepared to do whatever he had to do to make this right. He didn't care if Touichirou was self destructive but if he took Claw down with him…he wanted to take Claw down but not in this way. Not in a way that shifted power over towards Shigeko. He kept his ear to the ground. People were questioning Touichirou, his judgement, and they were starting to lose backers. Asagiri had apparently been the canary in the coalmine. Claw needed backers, and followers, or maybe it was more accurate to say that Touichirou did. To believe in Claw was to believe in Touichirou, the two were one in the same, but this…this was pushing more and more people towards Shigeko. He knew that she was keeping her people in Tokyo, making a point of it, and it had not gone unnoticed…
The only thing worse than a world ruled by Touichirou was one ruled by Shigeko…though he couldn't let either happen.
So he chose the lesser of two evils…who was currently hunched over his laptop. Half asleep, Fukuda knew that look. That feeling. Touichirou had a bad habit of falling asleep while right in the middle of his work, that was probably how he'd gotten all of the back problems that plagued him now. He was sleeping…vulnerable…it would have been easy to just tip him over…or grab a knife from the kitchen…or just…
Fukuda didn't have it in him.
"Touichirou? Suzuki? You still alive?" asked Fukuda he tapped Suzuki's aura with his. Suzuki's aura jumped, and then tried to bond with his. He didn't know if it was instinct or conscious action…but he knew that he had to use it. If he was doing it on purpose then maybe it wasn't over between them. Maybe they were still…maybe Fukuda hadn't lost his position. Maybe he could still manipulate Suzuki, pull on his puppet strings, get close enough to sabotage him…yes…that was what he wanted out of this.
An opening, an opportunity, and nothing more.
"Tadashi! Fukuda! How did you-what are you doing here?" asked Suzuki as he jumped up from his spot hunch over on the kitchen counter. He was a mess. Physically and emotionally. His aura was all over the place, like he couldn't decide if he wanted to lash out or create a cocoon out of his aura and never come back. His suit was missing, he was just in his slacks and an unbuttoned button down. His hair was long, longer than it had been in a while, and almost as wild as Sho's. He was more than in need of a shave, too, unless he was planning on growing a beard. He probably wasn't, he thought that they looked unkempt, he had said so all those years ago.
"You left the door unlocked." Said Fukuda as he sat down beside Suzuki. It was best to get near him as soon as possible, before he had time to put up all of his defenses….of course there was just as much of a chance that it would end up with him flying across the room…
It didn't.
"So, you just saw fit to let yourself in?" asked Suzuki quietly, his aura settling around himself like a thick blanket.
"I thought that you might need me." said Fukuda as he pushed a half full glass of ketchup and breadcrusts across the table….comfort food. He wasn't taking this well at all…worse than Fukuda would have thought. It was one thing to be upset at the fact that you'd lost something that was yours but to wallow like this…he hadn't even wallowed for Masami and she had been someone worth wallowing over.
"I have no need of you, neither of us is currently injured in any way. You may leave." Said Suzuki
"That's not what I'm talking about. You look terrible, Touichirou, worse than when Masami…worse than last time." Said Fukuda. He reached over to put his hand over Touichirou's…he gambled and he lost. Suzuki slapped his hand away with his powers. Hard. Hard enough to injure him. Fukuda hissed and pulled his hand back.
It hung limply at the end of his wrist.
"You'll live." Said Suzuki. Fukuda's aura glowed green as his bones knitted themselves back together. It hurt, of course, it always did…but he was fine. He'd had worse. He'd been in the middle of three of Suzuki's explosions at this point in his life.
Those hurt more than anything Suzuki was capable of throwing at him.
"But will you, that's the question." Said Fukuda
"When did I give you permission to start asking me questions, Tadashi?" asked Suzuki
"When have I ever needed your permission to ask a question?" asked Fukuda. He was trying to rile him up, but just a little. Enough to pull him out of this funk that he'd dug himself down into. This wasn't right. He never let himself get this way. Even when Masami had left he had never gotten this bad…things had never been this bad….
This was…not good.
"Stop asking questions, then. I do not give you permission, I don't need you to ask questions, I don't need you at all." Said Suzuki. That hurt…but no more than anything else that Suzuki had thrown at him at this point in their lives.
"I sincerely doubt that." Sid Fukuda with a laugh and a smile that he didn't really feel…but there was no way that Suzuki could tell. He wasn't even looking in his direction. He was looking down, now, at his laptop. Email. A string of messages…people asking for their men back…people asking what the point of this was…he had way too many opened at once.
The screen went black.
The lights went out. His phone chimed the way it did when it shut down. The hum of the refrigerator, even, went quiet….he knew what that meant. He knew that aura. Suzuki glanced behind them. Fukuda knew that he didn't have to. Who else could that have been besides Hatori, the fourth Suzuki child…the youngest Suzuki child.
And, yes, he was counting Mukai.
"What the fuck are you doing here?!" shouted Hatori. His aura had preceded him. Somehow it had been just as annoying as being in that man's, in that kid's, presence. Suzuki even seemed annoyed…Fukuda suppressed a look of triumph. Touichirou may not have noticed it but Hatori would and the last thing he needed right now was to deal with any more conflict with that kid.
"Nozomu, be quiet and get back to work." Said Suzuki as Hatori ran up. He slipped as he tried to come to a stop. Suzuki caught him…he should have let him fall. He would have let Sho fall, and he had so many times before. So he could learn, Suzuki had said so many times before, Sho had to learn…and apparently Hatori didn't…
Though, of course, Hatori wasn't in any way his son.
"But Fukuda's sitting right fucking there!" said Hatori, pointing at him. Suzuki slapped his hand away with his powers…gently. A lot more gently than he had with Fukuda…though Hatori was just a child, and Fukuda wouldn't have wanted to waste his energy on Hatori anyway.
"Yes, I can see. Now go away and get back to work." Said Suzuki
"I'm taking a break, but that's not important. Fukuda is sitting right fucking there-" said Hatori, his voice reaching octaves that even Sho's couldn't.
"Get back to work or I'll break you, Nozomu, and don't bother me again until you've found Shiori or someone who has something to do with her disappearance." Said Suzuki
"…I'm hungry." Said Hatori. Suzuki flicked his wrist and a pizza box flew into his arms. Hatori opened it and frowned.
"There. Sustenance. Now go sustain yourself so you can keep working and don't come out of that room until you've found Shiori. Now go!" said Suzuki pointing down the hall. Hatori held his pizza box in his hands, glanced down at it, and then up at Suzuki again.
"But Fukuda-" said Hatori
"You are not Sho, you're capable of showing me some basic obedience, now obey me and go before I start to get upset with you." said Suzuki
"Yes, Dad…" muttered Hatori as he stalked off back to his room. That was…not something that he ever wanted to hear again. He hoped that he didn't have to. If he had been around then Suzuki would never have so much as thought about adopting Hatori or any of the terrible decisions that he'd already made. Fukuda would never have let it get this far…but he'd had no choice…
But that was going to change.
"And you as well, Tadashi, get out. I don't need you right now." said Suzuki
"I think you do, I truly think that you do. Have you taken a look in the mirror lately?" asked Fukuda
"I don't have time for vanity right now. I need to find-" said Suzuki
"Shiori." Said Fukuda
"Yes. I don't have time to argue with you or worry about my appearance or Nozomu starving or…or anything of that nature. I need to focus on finding Shiori before it'd too late." Said Suzuki
"Did it even occur to you that she didn't want to be found? I mean doesn't this seem familiar to you?" asked Fukuda
"Tadashi. Shut your mouth. I don't like what you're implying. I know Shiori and I know that she would not just leave me…she has no reason to. She-" said Suzuki
"She loves you and you care for her. You care for her just like you cared for Masami." Said Fukuda. The glass full of ketchup and bread shattered. Fukuda didn't know if the red on his sweater was ketchup or blood from the pieces of glass which had torn through the acrylic and right into his arm.
"Do not speak her name and…and do not conflate the two! Masami is nothing like Shiori. Masami is unknowable, Shiori is simple. She would never do this to me. If she had wanted to dissolve our relationship then she would have told me, she tells me everything, and she had no reason to dissolve our relationship. She was, is, happy and so am I…and she wouldn't leave Osaka, either. She isn't one to shirk her work or abandon her home. She has fish, plants, and a cat which requite round the clock care. She would have taken them with her…even Sho could see that…" said Suzuki
"Sho? Wait, when did you speak to Sho? Why would you speak to Sho?" asked Fukuda
"Nozomu spoke to him. He's on his own crusade to find Shiori, I had no idea he was so attached, and I directed him to care for Shiori's home in her absence. He's good at caring for other living things, for some reason he enjoys it…why don't you just go to him and leave me alone? You've always enjoyed being his caretaker…for reasons I will never understand." Said Suzuki. Fukuda's mind was racing. This was….Sho should not have been on Suzuki's radar…and he shouldn't have been a part of this! He should have been with Shigeko, like he had said he would be, or back in Seasoning City with his little boyfriend. This was bad…he had to…he had to save Sho before he wound up getting hurt…
He had to leave…but he had to stay, too.
"I want…I want to be here, with you…Touichirou. I missed you a lot." Said Fukuda. He took Suzuki's hand in his and this time he made sure to lace their fingers. Suzuki's aura was showing. Fukuda braced himself for another bone breaking. He couldn't lose this chance. He had to take his shot. He needed to get back to his old position at his side…no matter what he had to do. It was for Sho, it was for the world, it was so he actually had something useful to do besides give Sho empty platitudes that of course they'd be able to stop Suzuki's world domination plans with their three other people and big dreams…if he could take it down from by Touichirou's side…if he could just be by his side again…
Even if it meant having to crawl back into bed with him.
"I have found myself occasionally missing your company as well…but that part is over now. You know that it's over." Said Suzuki
"But neither of us want it to be." Said Fukuda
"I made my choice." Said Suzuki
"I know, you chose her because you think that she can give you the son you always wanted…you know she's our age, right? She's already fallen off that fertility cliff that women do when they get to a certain age. It wouldn't even surprise me if she was menopausal by now." said Fukuda
"She isn't…and that's not for you to know, anyway." Said Suzuki
"You barely know her. it's been what, five years now?" asked Fukuda
"Approximately three years, I don't have the mental energy to give you a more specific number." Said Suzuki
"And how long have we known each other?" asked Fukuda
"Thirty three years, ten months, and two days...or four hundred six months and two days…or one thousand seven hundred sixty five weeks and six days….or 12,361 days…or 296,664 hours…or 17,799,840 minutes...or 1,067,990,400 seconds, depending on how you want to measure it." Said Suzuki. Fukuda didn't have time to let his jaw drop. It had been so long since they'd played 'human calculator'…but there was no time to get nostalgic about it now. No time to be impressed, either. There was time, however, to feel just a little triumphant. Suzuki had the mental energy for him, not her...
"Which number is greater?" asked Fukuda
"…I hardly see why that has anything to do with anything." Said Suzuki, unlacing their fingers.
"It has everything to do with everything, Touichirou. We've known each other…we've been together for over thirty years. Doesn't that mean anything to you? Because it does to me. I've given you the best years of my life and you've given me yours." Said Fukuda
"I hardly see how two people can trade something as insubstantial as time its self." Said Suzuki
"Well we can and we did. I've known you for so long…and you've known me…and that has to mean something." Said Fukuda
"I have no idea what you mean right now. Thirty three years is just that, thirty three years. Three years is just that, three years. What does it matter how long I've known either of you for? We had our time together and…and yes, it was enjoyable. My mind will even wander back to those times, sometimes, when I'm idle…" said Suzuki
"Me too…all the time. I think about what stupid kids we used to be, all the trouble we got into. I think about university, us figuring things out…remember when we tried cooking actual, non ramen or egg based, food?" asked Fukuda with a laugh.
"Which time? The time when you tried to make tempura and nearly burnt the house down, the time when I tried to make dumplings and nearly burnt the house down, or the time the two of us managed to burn a can of soup. Scorch a can of soup. You can't burn liquid." Said Suzuki
"You know, you'd think that you couldn't but you found a way." Said Fukuda
"No, it's you that scorched the soup. I told you to watch it while I finished my calculus assignment." Said Suzuki
"And I told you to watch the soup because I had a composition to finish." Said Fukuda
"You weren't working on a composition, you had dropped composition one at that point. You were working on your definitions of…well I can't remember, but it was something for the ethics class we were both forced to take." Said Suzuki
"Oh yeah, now I get it…just about the only time you've ever had to copy off of me in school." Said Fukuda
"I didn't mind, ethics wasn't worth my time and they still aren't. Neither is soup making…and it was you that left it unattended and it was you that ruined our good pot. I was, and still am, the leader and it is my right to delegate responsibility." Said Suzuki
"It's also your job to supervise your underlings." Said Fukuda
"I have never put you in that category…not fully. You've always just been…you, to me, for all of these years." Said Suzuki softly
"Yeah…all thirty three of them." said Fukuda, reaching for his hand. He pulled it away.
"I still have no idea why you keep on brining up the length of time which we've known each other for. It's completely irrelevant." Said Suzuki, his voice barely audibly perceptible.
"We've known each other for longer, I've known you for longer. I know you. I know that this isn't like you. You're letting your emotions get the best of you right now, you can't see this for what it is, and I'm worried about you, I care about you…I care for you." said Fukuda. The words felt like ashes in his mouth. I care for you. Touichirou hated saying 'I love you' because he felt like it was too imprecise for the depth of what he felt. You could love your parents, you could love an omelet, you could love a videogame, and you could love a human being you planned on marrying. Caring for someone was a much more intimate act, a much deeper feeling, and one that could not be confused for anything else.
One that he really shouldn't have been lying about…but Sho wasn't around to see so it didn't matter.
"Tadashi…Fukuda…go to Sho. He needs you. We both know that my son cannot be left to his own device so…so go. I'll send for you if your services are required." Said Suzuki. Before Fukuda could get another word in edgewise he felt himself sliding right out of the kitchen. The chair toppled as it hit the hallway rug and he went tumbling back.
It hurt.
That was what this pain was, nothing more. Just the pain of having the back of his head smashing against the floor. He was fine…he was in pain…he was…he needed to think this over. Regroup. Figure out his next course of action. Clearly that hadn't gone well but there had to be something. He had to get back in Suzuki's good graces and he had to put a stop to this…he just didn't know how…
He had to figure it out. It was just something that he needed to do.