Warning: The following chapter deals with the subjects of canon-typical emotional abuse and aftermath of such, brief threat of physical abuse, as well as touching on the cycle of abuse. Reader discretion advised.


Fire.

Heat.

Whispers.

Suffocating.

He tasted ash, heat, ice, iron.

Red Son stood, feeling suffocating heat on all sides. That wasn't right. He was a fire demon, he shouldn't feel suffocated by flame, why–

He knew this scene. He'd been here.

Father was in front of him. The whispers. The flames. Snarling.

Fear.

Fear gripped him tightly, moreso when glowing blue eyes turned towards him.

No.

No, please-

"Father?"

Red Son stiffened. That wasn't his own voice.

Suddenly, Father was no longer before him. Suddenly he was larger. Stronger.

"Father?" the soft, tiny voice behind him spoke again.

He turned, blinking past the blue. There was a small child there, holding a stuffed toy. The flames were behind them, he couldn't see any of their features, just dark shadow.

As he looked, the child took a tiny step back.

The whispers.

The taste of acrid iron, of wretched fear. Ash.

No. Nonono–

He felt his teeth gnash together.

No, please–!

His hand curled into a fist, the whispers laughed, he moved towards the child–

"Red Son, wake up!"

His eyes snapped open with a sharp gasp. His chest burned, his heart pounded in his throat as he stared up into Mei's face. She was leaning over him, her own expression stricken, one of her hands on his shoulder while the other hovered anxiously over his chest, as if she were unsure if it was okay to touch him.

He was in their bedroom. He was in their bed. Everything was fine. Nothing was wrong.

She was still pregnant. Their child wasn't–

Their child hadn't been–

He hadn't almost–

"Oh, no, no, no… Red Son…" Mei crooned, drawing him up into a sitting position. She hugged him as close as she was able to, drawing his face into her shoulder. "It's okay… it's okay, don't cry."

Was he crying? His face felt strange, like… Oh. There were dried tear tracks on his face. He didn't have it in him to feel ashamed or embarrassed.

Instead, he lifted his weak, trembling arms and hugged Mei tight, taking deep breaths.

"You're okay, we're both okay. We're all okay…" Mei kept repeating. He felt her fingers tangling in his hair, gently combing through. She'd done that a few times before. It'd always felt nice.

"We're okay… breathe, Love, breathe…" Mei whispered.

He breathed. Deep, shaky breath in. Longer exhale out. In. Out. It was alright. It was all alright. Everything was alright.

Slowly, his breathing grew steady, the tension flowing from his limbs. He focused on his breathing, on their current reality, on Mei's fingers running through his hair.

Finally, after a few minutes, he took a deep, shuddering breath. "I… I want to talk to MK's dads."

Mei said nothing. She simply nodded, arms tightening around his shoulders.


It was early. Probably too early, honestly, but Mei insisted on not waiting.

6:30 am found him sitting in the noodle shop, the blinds closed but cracked just enough to allow the cool sunlight to filter into the room. Despite the early hour, himself and the room's other occupants were fully-dressed as if it were mid-afternoon.

All three other occupants.

Red's eyes shifted to Sandy, the big burly demon approaching with a teacup. He hadn't expected him to have been called, too, but he guessed it made sense.

It was just. Going to be strange.

And he didn't want one more person judging him, but it was a bit late now, wasn't it?

"It's lavender tea," Sandy said quietly. "It'll ease your nerves."

"I'm not-" Red Son started to bite back.

Pigsy cut him off. "Kid. Mei called us up half an hour ago, saying you were specifically askin' for us. She didn't say why, only that somethin' happened, and we needed to talk to you." He gripped his own mug - coffee, not tea - and leaned across the table. "And no one's goin' anywhere til we learn why."

This had been Red Son's idea. He'd been the one to say he needed to talk. He was the reason they were all gathered here. This was what he had wanted.

And yet, at that moment, the words withered in his now-dry throat, and he couldn't think of how to force them out. He sharply looked away, towards the window, trying to see through the narrow slats. "It's… This is ridiculous," he began to mutter.

"Red Son."

"It - it was a moment of weakness, I'm alright. This was a waste of time and–"

Tang leaned forward, elbows on the table. "Red Son. Is it about the baby?"

With a barely-restrained jolt, Red turned to look at him. He blinked, staring into the other man's eyes. How… how…?

Tang nodded. "Thought so."

Next to him, Pigsy and Sandy wore the same understanding, unsurprised expressions.

"How…?" Red Son began slowly.

"It's not hard to figure out," Tang explained patiently. "First-time parent, you're glued to the pregnancy book… other things." He didn't elaborate the last point, instead taking a drink of coffee. "Whatever you're worried about, you can talk to us. We told you, we're in your corner."

"I don't… I doubt any of you would–"

"Try us," Pigsy said flatly.

"You'll think I'm–"

"We won't. No judgment here at all," Sandy assured.

I doubt that very much, Red Son wanted to say. But he bit his tongue, and looked back down. For a long time he didn't speak. Part of it was to gather his thoughts, try and figure out how to even begin. The other part, the petulant and stubborn part of him, was secretly hoping that if he waited it out, they'd have no choice but to give up and this could be dropped altogether.

But when he heard the minute hand on the clock tick once, twice, and then a third time and they didn't move, he had to admit defeat.

Pigsy had been right. Nobody was leaving until he talked.

"...I… want to do this right," he began slowly. It wasn't where he wanted to start, truthfully he didn't know how or where to start, but it was good as any. "I want to be a good parent. I want to raise the child well, I want to do the right thing, I don't…

I don't want to do what my parents did. I've been telling myself every day that I won't.

"I want to do this right, I need to be- I need to be perfect."

He hated that word. But it was the truth.

"I love them so much already, but what if… What if I do something wrong?" Red's voice tightened and he gripped the tea cup tighter, his hands trembling. He didn't dare look up at the rest of the group, instead staring at his own reflection in the tea. His vision briefly blurred, and he blinked hard. No. No, don't you dare cry! "What if I mess it up? Just… Just what if I…?"

He couldn't finish. That one question seemed enough: what if?

What if?

What if?

He kept his head bowed, still not daring to look. He didn't want to see their faces, the disappointment, the outrage that he didn't have this perfectly handled. He waited for the judgment, the clipped words.

But they didn't come.

Instead, he felt a presence in front of him, and then a heavy hand on his shoulder.

"Kid…" Pigsy's gruff voice was uncharacteristically soft and patient. "I mean this in the best, nicest possible way…

But you're going to."

Red Son's head snapped up. He half-glared at the pig demon, barking out a noise somewhere between a laugh and a scream. "How is that supposed to make me feel better?!"

"Just listen… You are going to make mistakes with this kid. You are going to have times where you don't know what to do. You can prepare and research and plan all you want, but there's still going to be times when you'll be completely lost, and you might make a poor decision."

Ah. So they all knew he wouldn't be a good father. Red started to look down again–

"And that's normal. That is alright."

"Oh, I'm sure that's easy for you to say," Red muttered, voice still thick. He looked away sharply, trying to hold onto the temper he had. If he wasn't frustrated or angry, he would cry, and he didn't need these men to see him doing that.

"...Red Son, do you think Pigsy and I are good parents?"

"As annoying as the Noodle Boy can be at times… you did a great job with him, I can tell. Clearly you didn't make any mistakes."

"Do you think we didn't make a mistake at any point?"

Red Son stared.

There was a short pause as the three men stared back.

Then a sigh.

"One night when MK was four," Tang began, leaning back. He put his coffee mug on the table, staring at a spot above Red Son's head, eyes distant in memories. "I had to watch him by myself. And that meant I had to make dinner. I can cook rudimentary things, and I thought simple stovetop noodles wouldn't be too bad. And it wasn't, that part was fine."

"So…?"

"So I gave him his food, and he took one bite and spat it out. I was frustrated, it had been a really hard day for me, and I just wanted this to go quietly and smoothly. So I got upset. I actually raised my voice, and I told him he was not moving from his spot until the entire bowl was gone. He started to cry, but I was too upset to care. I thought he'd just cry it out and then eat.

But when I sat down and took a bite of my food, I realized I'd grabbed the wrong seasonings. It was fine for me, but much too spicy for a four-year-old. I remember I looked back up at him, and he was still trying to eat, just like I'd told him to."

Red stared, slightly stunned.

Tang nodded. "I felt awful. Like I was the worst parent in the world."

"...what did you do?"

"I gently took his baby chopsticks away, had him spit out what he had in his mouth. And then I gave him a hug and apologized. And I told him he didn't have to eat it, that I'd been the one who messed up, and I was sorry." Tang looked down, and a tiny smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "And then I gave him ice-cream for dinner, because he deserved it."

"Wha- you told me you'd made him a sandwich!"

"Surprise~"

"Alright, but," Red Son sniffed, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "That's one thing. One mistake–"

"When he was thirteen, I got a call during the rush that he'd gotten in trouble for fighting and I needed to come get him," Pigsy interrupted. "I was the only one home, so I had no choice. I was livid. I didn't even ask to hear his side, I just went in, signed the paper acknowledging he'd been in trouble, and took him home. He kept trying to talk to me, but I kept cutting him off, shouting that I didn't wanna hear it, he was grounded for two weeks. I remember he'd tried to say 'Lemme explain' but I just yelled. He ran to his room and we didn't speak to each other the rest of the night.

It wasn't til the next day, when a girl and her parents came by to tell me I'd raised a good kid that I found out the full story. His classmate was being harassed, and he'd stood up for her. The other guy had thrown the first punch, so MK retaliated.

When I heard that, I felt like the absolute worst. I should have heard him out."

"What did you do?" Red breathed.

"Same as Tang. I apologized. I told him I'd done wrong, and he'd done the right thing. Told him he was ungrounded, and we were goin' out to do whatever he wanted. All day that day, I kept makin' sure he knew I meant it." Pigsy grinned. "An' then I went back to the school and let 'em have it for punishin' the wrong guy."

"And none of this is even scratching the surface of the little mistakes, arguments, and general everything else that happened," Tang added. "Believe us, there was a lot more."

"There are things we still think about and wish we'd approached in a different way. Things we wished we'd done differently. That's part of parenthood, you will make mistakes and you will think what if I'd done it this way instead? But you keep going, you apologize when you make them upset, you tell them they are loved, and you always strive to be better."

"Alright, but- but those are one-off moments," Red Son argued. "What if… What if I treat them like…"

Sandy spoke up for the first time in a while. "As you were treated?" he finished gently, his deep voice a reassuring rumble.

Red Son froze. Swallowed. Nodded.

"Your concern is valid," Sandy continued. "But being honest, from what we know of you and what we've seen… We don't think you will."

"How can you be sure?"

"I feel it in these huge bones of mine," Sandy said, almost jovially. "You'll be wonderful."

"And if you feel overwhelmed, or stressed, or need any further help, we'll all be there, for you and Mei, and for the baby."

Red Son's chest constricted. His vision blurred once again, and when he blinked, he felt warmth run down his cheeks. A pink hand reached over to clasp one of his own.

"You're fine, kid," Pigsy said. "You're fine here, go ahead."

He did.