Angel Feather [249]Chapter Text
17: Angel Feather
Joshua's search for threads had nearly come to an end. He only had a single Gatito accessory left to uncover. He had saved the best for last, it seemed, given the modest brilliance and humble beauty of the Gatito brand that none other could hope to match. Even though their designer and procurer had quietly disappeared several years prior, the brand's influence had remained palpably felt. When the designer returned, it would herald a new era in Shibuya's fashion.
Perhaps it would even rekindle the youth's previously ardent fever towards passion in individualistic self-expression.
After confirming that the other Gatto Nero designer would agree to whatever meal the race's dinner chose to break their fast with, Rhyme and Beat departed.
Shiki and Neku—along with the other Gatto Nero designer—resumed their search. Gatito had a wide variety of accessories, fitting the city's most prolific designer and their unimaginably rapid output. With Joshua apparently unwilling to inform them of which accessory in particular he sought, they passed over anything Gatito that they could find.
A black promo tote, the earliest edition of which had promoted something called "WEWY." A bright pink lipstick. A ram-headed belt buckle. A pair of crimson headphones similar to yet distinct from the ones that Beat wore. A familiar take on a pendant, crowned and boned. A pair of scarlet glasses that might have made one better at Tin Pin Slammer. A pair of violet headphones, practically identical to those trademark 'phones that had once seen a certain Legendary Player crowned with sound. A skull beanie akin to the one that Shiki had just made Beat. A Mr. Mew doll that made the other Gatto Nero wrinkle her nose. A mysterious white feather, acquired by divine means—
Neku held the plumage by the stalk between thumb and forefinger for Joshua to inspect. It glittered iridescently, shimmers of every hue flowing over its surface in mesmerizing patterns above its gentle luminosity. If one listened carefully, one could almost Imagine it humming: the song of a distant shore, the music of the spheres. "I don't remember this one."
"Hee hee. No, you wouldn't," Joshua answered, stepping forward towards the feather. Possibly the slight dangerousness implied by his smirk brought Neku to hold onto the feather a little more tightly. "That's the last one, dear. Hand it over."
Shiki and the other Gatto Nero designer looked up from the boxes through they had been searching. The other Gatto Nero designer adjusted her bucket hat. Shiki frowned. "Neku? Josh? Is something wrong?"
Joshua eyed Neku. Neku eyed Joshua. "Well, dear? Is something wrong?"
"Is this—" Neku glanced at the feather, then back again at Joshua. "—what you were here to collect the entire time?"
"Hee hee. Weren't you paying attention, dear? I told you that all of Shibuya would be in grave danger. I came to collect all of my old threads from you. Don't worry, Neku... I wasn't lying when I said that I would stay the night."
He unfurled his fingers. Presenting Neku with his open palm, he waited expectantly.
Shiki slowly stood from where she had kneeled in front of the box. "Josh... What's going on? It feels like the mood's shifted."
The other Gatto Nero designer took Shiki's hand. She seemed to have the unfortunate tendency not to weigh her words; the same tendency had undoubtedly contributed to her misunderstanding with Shiki many years prior. "Josh, what are you talking about? Um, oh! I wanted to ask earlier, but if you're going to stay here, did you bring, um, whatever medications you usually take? Oh! I hope that that didn't come across as rude! I just meant, with you talking to the ceiling earlier, and now talking about Shibuya being in grave danger... I don't mean to assume—"
"Eri, dear. I am being deathly serious, and I intend to reap what I sow." Joshua drew himself to his full height: just slightly above Neku's, by choice. "I admit that spending this time with all of you has been rather entertaining. I'll have to come around more often if I can find the time in my busy schedule."
He crooked his fingers inwards.
"And I will stay overnight and try whatever breakfast the Bito siblings choose. Come, Neku. Don't leave your date waiting. It's very rude."
Neku breathed in. "I haven't forgiven you. But I trust you. You took care of things then, and you'll take care of things now. Just—think about letting us in. Whatever's going on, we can help."
Shiki nodded. "I'll do whatever I can for Shibuya, and for you. You don't have to shoulder whatever it is alone."
The other Gatto Nero designer glanced between them. "Um? Oh! Y-Yes! I'm happy to do what I can, too!"
"Such darling friends. Trust your partner, Neku. I'm not even giving you a gun this time." Joshua kept his hand out. "One of life's little crossroads, and you don't even have to pull a trigger."
"Um...? Shiki, what's J-Josh talking about...?"
His partner, proxy, and friend closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them. "Okay. Here you go, Joshua." He moved to set the feather down. "...See you at Hachiko this time?"
The softness whispered over Joshua's palm. "That was a nice distraction." He gripped the plumage, smirked, and—
Nothing happened.
His eyes widened. He stared at the feather, his mouth agape, his features twisted into a shocked mockery of his usual unflappable demeanor. "No..."
Joshua gripped the feather more firmly. Shiki and Neku exchanged glances as the former squeezed the other Gatto Nero's hand back.
"Sanae!" He directed the shout upwards. "Really? I played your little Game! It's their world, and they get to decide what to do with it! You said it yourself! Answer me, Sanae! I know you can hear me! I know you're watching!"
The other Gatto Nero designer paled. "U-Um, is Josh...?"
Shiki stroked the back of her hand. "He's going to be okay. We'll be here to make sure of that."
Neku grabbed his own shoulder, his hand running under the fabric of the cardigan.
"Sanae!"
No rainbow cascaded from the heavens; no bush burned before him; no ram's horn blew in the distance.
"Sanae..."
For once, Joshua sank to the floor himself. Curling inwards on himself in an uncharacteristically vulnerable pose, he kneeled in front of Neku. Would he have considered that angle as suiting him?
Neku crouched down beside him. Quitting the green cardigan, he glanced up at Shiki—she nodded back her permission—and wrapped the cardigan around Joshua's shoulders.
"Hey. Whatever's happening, we can figure it out together. You're not alone. If you let us in, we can help." He set his hand on Joshua's shoulder, his movement light and ginger, almost feathery, as if testing to see whether or not Joshua would flinch.
When Joshua didn't flinch, Neku rubbed his partner's back. "Joshua?"
The white feather floated down as gently as a cherry blossom in the spring: most beautiful, as they said, in that ephemeral moment between falling from the bough and dying on the earth. Transient. Momentary. The gentle melancholy of the passage of time. That quintessentially mortal experience.
Joshua's trembling hands rose to his shades. Grasping the frames on either side, he drew them down the bridge of his nose and off of his face.
They clattered to the ground, dark and still.
The whites of his eyes glistened with an unfamiliar wetness.
"Neku, Shiki, Eri, dears." The mixture of betrayal, rage, resignation, acceptance, and vulnerability in his timbre made him as though he were going through all five stages of grief at once. "You were being serious about letting me have the bed, weren't you?"
I, Sanae Hanekoma, will finish this report here.
I leave the former Composer of Shibuya, one Yoshiya "Joshua" Kiryu, in the capable hands and hearts of his proxy, one Neku Sakuraba, and his fellows.
I trust that they will assist him on his transition into life in the RG.
As Producer of Shibuya, I have duties to attend to, serving the now and future Composer of Shibuya.
But that is another story and shall be told another time.