NOTE: Another Log is here for you guys.
Prompt given by: Blackmetalzane22
Enjoy and Review!
Log 18: Thinking About You
Cover Image: A small Kevin Levin stood alone in the busy streets of a city. People walked past him as if they didn't even notice that he was there.
Until a little girl with brownish orange hair had turned her head to look at him as she walked by with her parents.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Clic-
"Are you going to keep doing that?" Ben asked, irritated. The boy held one of his Superman comic books in his hands.
Gwen, who was absentmindedly pressing the spacebar on her laptop, didn't answer him. Her finger is still pushing the key in a toneless rhythm. Outside rain softly tapped against the exterior of the Rustbucket as if to match Gwen's sound.
Ben grumbled at being ignored. He got up from his seat with his comic book to continue his reading in the back. As he did, he found Yukiko taking up the backseat. Her legs stretched out in relaxation as she delightfully read her own book. Ben looked back to see that Gwen was still tapping the spacebar and he didn't want to sit up front with his grandpa. So, Ben did the only thing he could do.
He pushed Yukiko's legs out of the way, disrupting his cousin.
Yukiko paused her reading to glare at Ben. "You could've just said something, Ben. That was rude."
He glanced over at her. "Yeah, well that would've taken too long."
"It would've been a few seconds."
"That's too long for a kid."
Yukiko rolled her eyes at him. "What's wrong, Ben? Thought you were reading at the table?" Which was the whole reason she was taking up the backseat in the first place.
"I was until Gwen decided to be annoying," Ben answered.
"What did she do?"
"You mean you don't hear that?" Ben pointed at Gwen.
Yukiko realized what Ben meant. She could now hear the absent-minded tapping that Gwen was making. "What's wrong with Gwen?" Yukiko asked.
"I don't know, but I ain't curious enough to find out," Ben shrugged. He returned his attention to his comic book.
Yukiko sighed at him, not surprised that he'd rather focus on something else. She put her bookmark in between the pages so as to not lose her place in the book. Putting it down, she got up and walked over to Gwen.
Ben peaked his head up from his comic book to look at his cousins.
Yukiko crept up to Gwen, peering at the girl's screen. The heiress saw that Gwen was mindlessly staring at images of broken pencils. While there are a lot of things about her little cousins that confuse her, this might've taken the top spot. "Gwen? Are you okay?"
"Hm…"
Well…it was a response. Yukiko decided to press a bit further. "Why are you looking at broken pencils?"
"Because that's my heart right now."
"Y-your heart?" Yukiko questioned.
Gwen turned around to face her cousin. "Yukiko. Do you ever worry about Yu?"
Slightly confused and caught off guard by the sudden question, Yukiko took a moment to gather her thoughts. "I do worry about him a lot. Danger always seemed to lurk around the corner for him. Though, considering all we've done this summer I don't have much room to talk." Yukiko paused when she saw the serious look on Gwen's face. It seemed her answer hadn't been what Gwen wanted. "Scoot over, Gwen."
Gwen did as told, allowing Yukiko to sit next to her. "What's wrong, Gwen?"
"...I don't know." Gwen lied, averting her eyes.
"Of course, something is wrong. You wouldn't have asked me that question if something wasn't wrong," Yukiko said. The younger girl still wasn't budging and just turned her head to the window. The heiress realized that Gwen wouldn't be willing to talk until there was a mutual understanding between them both. With a deep breath, Yukiko gathered her own thoughts.
"There's a lot about Yu-kun that scares me." Gwen's attention swiftly turned back to her but didn't try to show interest. "When I first joined the Investigation Team, he was always leading the charge no matter what. It worried me, because it always looked like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. I once asked Yosuke-kun about it, since he was the closest to Yu-kun at the time…"
"So, what did you want to talk to me about, Yukiko-chan?" Yosuke Hanamura asked. He was dressed in his Yasogami High uniform. Both he and Yukiko were currently on the school's rooftop. He was wondering why Yukiko wanted to speak with him all of sudden, usually when class was over, and they weren't going into the TV she would've been leaving with Chie.
Yukiko was staring out through the roof's fence, watching students leave the building. "I wanted to talk about Narukami-kun."
Yosuke cocked an eyebrow. "Eh? About Partner?" Yosuke smirked teasingly. "Got a crush or something?" His humor died when the heiress glared at him.
"If you're not going to take things seriously then I'll just go."
"Wait!" Yosuke stopped her from leaving. "I was joking, sorry." He meant the apology. "We don't really talk much outside of the TV World and Chie constantly keeps most of your attention. I just wanted to break the tension."
Yukiko calmed down, realizing that Yosuke was right. "Right. Sorry, I'm still getting used to interacting with people other than Chie-chan. Especially boys."
Yosuke shrugged, not bothered by it. "It's fine. You'll get there eventually, and we'll be there to help you along the way."
"Thank you."
"What is it you want to know about Partner?" Yosuke asked.
Yukiko bit the inside of her mouth, trying to find the right words. She knew what she wanted to talk about but was finding it difficult to get the words out. "I…It's just that he seems so focused and strained. He's always pushing himself while we're training sometimes, as if he's preparing for something."
Yosuke nodded his head. "Yeah, we don't know when the next person will show up on the Midnight Channel."
"I get that. You guys fought hard to save me from my dungeon. But there always seems to be more with him. As if the world itself will collapse if he doesn't continue marching forward. Can you not see it?" Yukiko explained.
Yosuke didn't respond for a few seconds. He turned his head to the fence as the wind softly blew past the both of them. "I do see it. I've seen it since we started doing this."
"Then you have to tell him to slow-"
"Can't."
"Why not!? I-I don't want to see him hurt himself over this!" Yukiko exclaimed.
Yosuke chuckled softly. "You've only known him for a short while and you're already this concerned for him."
A red-hot blush burned her cheeks. "I-It's just that I'm the team's healer! So, I have to make sure you're all in top shape!"
"I know. But I can't just tell him to slow down and take it easy," Yosuke said.
"Why not?"
"Because we both made a promise to each other that we'll solve this mystery no matter what. To bring peace back to this town. Partner cares a lot about the people around him, even if he hasn't known us for that long. Just the fact that we're all risking our lives together to do this is enough of a reason for him."
"You worry about him, because he cares?" Gwen asked.
Yukiko shook her head. "I worry about him, because of how far he's willing to push himself because he cares. What I love the most about him is his ability to love the people around him as if he's known them his whole life. It's the fact that he throws himself in harm's way, because of it that I grow worried."
Gwen slowly nodded his head. "I-I think I get it. If you love someone enough, then you'd be willing to protect them. Even if it means getting hurt in the process."
"You think that's how Kevin felt?"
"He must-" Gwen stopped once she realized what Yukiko had said. Her head turned almost robotic-like to stare at her cousin's teasing smile. "I-I-I wasn't talking about that jerk! W-why would you even assume that!?" Gwen's face was a deep shade of red.
"It was pretty obvious that you were thinking about it," Yukiko replied.
Gwen huffed. "Then why didn't you call me out on it earlier?"
"Because it seemed like you were struggling with something. Can you tell me what's bothering you now?" Yukiko requested.
The witch in-training hesitated for a moment before sighing. She had wanted to speak to Yukiko about this, but now that she was actually talking about it; everything just seemed so jumbled in her head. "I-I'm just worried about him, I guess. We left him alone in the Null Void with Vilgax and I can't help but think of the worst sometimes." There were nights where she'd have nightmares about Vilgax coming back with Kevin's corpse or ones where they all failed to escape the Null Void. It sent chills down her spine just thinking about the horrors Vilgax could be inflicting onto Kevin.
Yukiko gently placed her hand over Gwen's. "I know you're worried. I can't say I blame you either. You had managed to bring out the best in him at the last moment. When nobody else in the world believed that Kevin could do something good, you still held on and had faith in him. You didn't abandon him-"
"BUT I DID!"
Silence was the only sound left in the Rustbucket after Gwen's shout. Max had pulled over the Rustbucket, so that he could see what was going on with Gwen. Ben had dropped his comic book after getting surprised by Gwen's reaction.
"Gwen-" Yukiko didn't expect such a reaction either.
"I abandoned him alone in that godforsaken place with our worst enemy! There's no way out of there as far as we know! Kevin is alone in a dimension filled with creatures and a warlord that will want nothing more than to kill him!" Gwen was crying at this point; her emotions having grown too much to bear. "I-I promised him that I would never abandon him! B-but we just left him!"
Yukiko pulled Gwen into a hug, rubbing her back. "We had no other choice, Gwen. If we didn't leave, then…"
"We would've been trapped in there too. I know that…but you're the one who told us just how important promises are. And I broke it even after knowing just how much it meant to him!" Gwen cried.
Yukiko was slightly confused. "How would you know that, Gwen?"
She sniffled and coughed. "I-I could feel it. It was like our hearts were connected or something. I could feel his loneliness and just how much my promise meant to him. Almost as if it was the first nice thing anyone has ever said to him."
Yukiko pulled away from Gwen, using her sleeves to wipe the girl's tears. The heiress understood Gwen's feelings the most. She always felt like she could feel whatever it was Yu was feeling as if their hearts were connected by some invisible bond. "You said that your hearts were connected, right?" Gwen nodded her head. "Then you must've been able to feel why Kevin did what he did." Gwen didn't make a move this time. "I may not have had the best opinion about Kevin, and I can't say that I trust him completely still, but there is one thing about him that I'm certain about."
Gwen looked up at Yukiko, waiting for her to speak. The way Gwen was looking at her was as if the girl's entire emotional state was hanging on a thread.
Yukiko smiled softly and brushed away the last tear on Gwen's face. "It's that he wanted to protect the person he cares about the most."
"...Who he cares about the most…" Gwen repeated slowly.
"He's a jerk." Ben joined the conversation. His insensitive comment elicited a strong glare from Yukiko. He quickly continued before Yukiko could end his short life. "I-I mean that he's incredibly stubborn. I still don't know what it is that you see in him, but after everything we've been through, I doubt he would go down so easily."
"Ben's right." Max had joined his grandkids. "I don't think I've ever seen someone more tenacious as Kevin. Just when you think that you've seen the last of him, he surprises you once again."
"He managed to survive for so long on his own, evaded Steel and his men, survived that bazooka shot to his chest, and came back from a completely different galaxy. The Null Void may be a new territory for him, but I doubt any of that would keep him down," Yukiko said.
Ben smirked. "And if I could kick Vilgax's tail then Kevin totally could too! I even taught him how to use my powers back on the Mega Cruiser, so he'd definitely win!"
Gwen sniffled a bit, blowing her nose into some tissues. She greatly appreciated her family trying to cheer her up. She knew her fears might've been a bit overblown and that feeling sad about a guy who's tried to kill Ben repeatedly may seem strange. But there was something about Kevin that resonated with her heart. "Thank you, guys. I shouldn't be crying over this. I look like a doofus."
"No, you don't, Gwen. There's nothing wrong with feeling the way you do about someone. The heart works in mysterious ways. We all have these moments," Yukiko said.
"I just want him to know that he isn't alone. That there are people waiting for him," Gwen said.
Ben shrugged. "He'll probably try to kill me again."
"We'll work on that." Gwen chuckled. "Though, I still feel like I let him down in some way."
Yukiko shook her head. "You didn't, Gwen. You still care about him, right?"
"Of course!"
"Then your promise with him hasn't been broken. While you may not be there with him physically, your hearts are still connected. Your feelings haven't abandoned him at all and I'm sure he knows that."
NULL VOID INCARCECON:
A human Kevin Levin stood alone in the prison yard of the Null Void prison. Most other inmates wanted nothing to do with the boy, leaving him all alone.
"What are you staring out into space for, kid?"
…Well, except for one person.
Turning around Kevin saw the one person in this godforsaken dimension that actually seemed to care about him. A fellow inmate named Kwarrel, an alien with grey skin, pointed ears, and a scar running across his right eye. "Nothing…" Kevin answered.
"It ain't nothing if it got you even more down than usual." Kwarrel stood next to him. "You gonna tell me what's wrong?"
"Not really."
"Fine." Kwarrel shrugged. "Guess, I'll eat your share of dinner tonight."
"EH!?" Kevin exclaimed, shocked. "No fair! You can't just do that!"
"Can and will unless you tell me what's wrong," Kwarrel didn't back down. He and Kevin stared down one another for a minute until the 11-year-old's stomach growled.
Embarrassed by the loud grumble, Kevin blushed. "F-fine! You win."
"Of course, I did." Kwarrel smirked.
Kevin rolled his eyes, staring back out to the red skies of the Null Void. "I never told you how I got in here, did I?"
"Nope. The first time I saw you was when the guards dragged in your busted up body. You never explained how you ended up in that state in the first place."
Kevin took a deep breath as he recalled all of the previous events that transpired this summer. "There was this family. A bunch of weird people if you ask me."
"How weird?"
"One had a watch that could turn him into aliens, the other could shoot fire out of nowhere, and the last one could use magic. Lastly, there was their grandfather but he was just a regular old man," Kevin explained.
"I see. Were they the ones who trapped you in here?"
Kevin didn't know how to answer that one exactly. "I-I wouldn't say that exactly. In the end it really was me who brought all of this on myself. But I was too angry to admit it. Too busy hating Ben and blaming him for everything."
Kwarrel figured that this Ben and his family were the reason as to why Kevin was so angry. The eyes of a young boy should never be filled with so much hate, but there was more in there. "What else happened?"
"I had teamed up with their worst enemy in an attempt to get revenge. I didn't care what happened to me as long as Ben got what he deserved but…"
"But what?"
"Someone made me think differently, that maybe I wasn't such a freak in the first place. That I'm not really alone out there. She somehow wormed her way into my head," Kevin sighed.
"Ah. So, it's a girl. It all makes sense now," Kwarrel teased.
"How does everything make sense after hearing that!?" Kevin yelled, blushing.
"You're too young to fully understand this. Women have this way of influencing how we men think. That's how powerful love is," Kwarrel explained.
"I-I don't love her!" Kevin refuted. "She's a smart mouth, hot tempered, a nerd, and annoying to the tenth degree!"
"Kinda reminds me of you."
"I'm nothing like that!"
"You can say that all you want, but the heart speaks differently, kid. Trust me, you'll realize what I mean once you're older," Kwarrel said. "Anyway, how does this story end?"
Kevin relaxed, fighting off his blushing face. "When it seemed like we had won. She asked me to save her cousin Ben. That if I didn't save him then we'd all end up dead in here." Kevin's fingers tightened around the holes of the fence. "She promised me that she'd never abandon me and that I'd never be alone again. And I guess…that's all I ever wanted to hear." For his entire life he had felt that he was alone and that nobody else would ever know how he felt.
But then he met the Tennysons and for the first time ever Kevin Levin felt that maybe…maybe it wouldn't be so bad to be surrounded by other people.
Chapter End
NOTE: I decided to add on a bit of Kevin at the end here, because it felt right to just know how he feels. There are a lot of things that happen to Kevin during his time in the Null Void and I do kinda want to play around with it.
That flashback between Yukiko and Yosuke was me wanting to have a nice interaction between the two. Since Yukiko and Chie never really treat Yosuke with any form of respect ever in the main game and spin offs. There's teasing but then there's just being an asshole to the guy.
I really love the idea that Anodites are really susceptible to love or at least the concept of true love. Their energy subconsciously matches with that of someone else almost like a soul mate. I'll explore more of this when I start exploring Max and Verdona more.
Hope you all enjoyed!
