Chapter Text
Knock Knock
Rui knocks on the door a few times, Emu on his left and Nene on his right, his hand still hovering close to the door. They are currently standing at the door to the Tenma’s house, the sun already long gone, now replaced with the moonlight peaking through some stray clouds.
“Do you think he’s coming?” Emu pouts a little as she looks towards Rui.
“I mean, the lights are on, so he should be, right?” Nene answers, Nene also looking towards Rui. Emu begins to lean a little off to the side, attempting to catch a glimpse of any movement from inside the house.
Emu frowns, “Maybe he doesn’t want to see us.” She returns to her original standing position.
Rui hasn’t moved from when he knocked on the door. “Rui, are you okay?” Nene asks with a bit of concern in her voice.
His hand finally drops, “Yes, I’m fine.” He hesitates a moment before speaking, his eyes don’t look at his companions beside him, but are locked onto the door in front. “Doesn’t seem like he’s answering though…”
He brings his hand up to his chin in thought, with his eyebrows creasing. “What do we do now?” Emu looks up towards Rui as he finally makes eye contact with her, concern laced across her face.
“We try something else, come.” Rui motions with his hands and turns from the door. He begins making his way along the wall of the building, rounds a corner, and eventually ends up in the backyard, Emu and Nene close behind.
“There.” Rui points to a large window that spans across the wall. “The light is still on, he could be there. Unfortunately, his window is a little too tall for me to see.”
“Oh! Rui-kun lift me up!” Rui crouches down as Emu latches onto his back with her arms hugging his shoulders, his hands finding their way under her legs for support. They are just high enough to just see inside of the window.
“Hmmmm,” Emu hums in contemplation, her eyes scanning the interior of the room. “I can’t see him.” Rui gently sets Emu back down on the ground, none of them say anything until Nene speaks up.
“Are you sure he’s even here?” Rui, again, looks deep in thought, his face looking even more worried than before. “Rui…” Nene’s voice brings him back from his thoughts. “Really, are you sure you’re fine? Your feelings matter too y’know?”
No. he’s been so worried after everything that happened. He wants Tsukasa to trust him, and to open up more. Yet he knows Tsukasa isn’t one to openly talk about problems like this. If something is bugging him, he most likely won’t talk about it and he will try to deal with it himself. But after this, hopefully, things will get better. They will find him and they will help him no matter what.
“Thanks for your concern Nene, but I’ll be fine, once this is over.” He says with a soft voice, directed at Nene so only she can hear, and gives her a little smile.
Now that it’s basically confirmed that Tsukasa is not, in fact, inside, their problem got more complex. “Where do you think he went? The last time I even talked to him was at the arcade, I haven't seen him since…”
“Hmmm… you know, this gives me a little bit of déjà vu.” Rui hums in thought.
“Eh??” Both Emu and Nene respond in unison.
“Remember how this all started? He went missing, just like what’s happening now. Maybe it’s not a coincidence at all.” He directs his gaze back to the window with his hand on his chin.
“That…kind of makes sense.”
“So then,” He turns back around to face the other two, “Where do you think he could’ve gone?”
Emu raises her hand and gasps at the realization, “I have an idea!” She knows, Rui does too.
He gives her a smile, “Then let’s go.”
The three of them once again find themselves surrounded by the unsaturated and dull colours of Sekai; if Tsukasa is the source of this problem then hopefully this will be the last time they will have to see it in this state.
Did Tsukasa really think he could avoid this forever? No matter what happens, they will make sure they leave this place better than when they arrived.
The three of them begin scanning their surroundings for any sign of the star, yet all they can see is rubble and the monochrome environment.
“Are you sure he’s here?” Nene fidgets with her hair nervously.
“I don’t know where else he could just disappear to, so this should be it.” Rui scans all around them some more. “Ah-” His eyes land on a familiar figure, now standing some distance away, eyes also trained on the three of them.
Rui mutters under his breath, faint enough that it caught Emu and Nene’s attention, “Tsukasa-kun-”
Tsukasa makes his appearance, taking a few steps towards them, his face tells no story and his eyes tired. It still looks like him, but his aura is completely different.
Once Tsukasa makes eye contact with them all, he lights up, well, as much as he can. But instead of happiness all they can sense is shock and a hint of fear in his newfound expression.
“Why are you here?!” He tries to take a stance, to stand his ground, to act strong; like the shame of him running away from everything keeps gnawing at his back. Rui takes a step forward, in return Tsukasa takes one back.
He acts like a cornered animal, trying to make himself appear strong while knowing he has nowhere to run.
Rui sighs before speaking, “I think you know why we’re here, Tsukasa-kun.” Tsukasa looks down, avoiding all eye contact. His face is scrunched up, like he’s deep in thought about something.
After a few seconds of silence between them, Tsukasa says something, “Yeah, I should’ve been kicked out by now.” He says it with so little projection in his voice that only Rui and himself would be able to hear.
Rui immediately perks up at this, what does he mean by that? “What?” is all he can punch out, like if all the air in his lungs disappeared.
“Don’t- don’t do this, Rui.” Tsukasa’s voice begins to break a little at this, and he still averts his eyes from everyone, “That’s why you benched me right? I’ve been… rather unhelpful, I’m sure you’ve noticed.”
A bittersweet smile makes its way across his face which suddenly goes back to a wavering frown, and his glossy eyes on the verge of tears. “So- just say it already! You don’t have to hold back anymore, I get it now!”
Tsukasa finally looks up, and he can see… hurt? Is that pain in Rui’s eyes? Or is it more of pity?
Either way, he can’t stand his boyfriend looking at him with that face, it just makes him want to run away, again.
“...Tsukasa-kun. What are you talking about?” It’s his turn for his voice to crack. “We would never think about you as ‘unhelpful’, and we definitely wouldn't think about kicking you out. I don’t know why you thought we would, but if I did anything to make you think that way, I’m sorry.” The tears welling up in his eyes finally fall, the dam finally broke.
He didn’t even realize he was crying until he felt wetness on his cheek. Rui reached up to wipe the tears away, and he looks at his hand, the residue glistening on his finger tips. “Tsukasa-kun, I don’t know what you’re feeling, but…” He sees that Tsukasa is starting to back away, he can hear the frantic and shallow breaths he’s taking, his face becoming even more laced with pain.
“I’m sorry.” Tsukasa’s voice is so frail, Rui has only heard it like this once before; it was before his audition for Rio, when they watched the show before.
He sees Tsukasa continue to back away, and in this time he desperately wants to chase after him, to hold him and tell him that it’s okay. His feet don’t move, and he watches as the usually bright golden hair vanishes from his line of sight.
He’s only able to register what happened when he feels a hand on his arm. He looks down and sees Nene, Emu is on his other side.
“We have to go. He can’t go far.” Nene attempts to bring him back to his senses, he takes a deep breath in and sharply exhales.
“Right.” The three of them go after the star in the direction he ran to, almost tripping on rubble and spare parts of what once used to be presumably one of the rides that inhabited this Sekai.
The way they went to didn’t have exactly what they were looking for, Tsukasa is still nowhere to be seen, but there’s no other place he could’ve gone to. The three of them now stand in front of a glowing light, a fragment Sekai.
Without any hesitation, they reach forward and enter its light, it’s the only thing left shining in this Sekai; other than the star himself.
A stage, an empty audience, a piano in the center of the spotlight; these are the things that Rui sees first once he regains his vision from the previously bright lights. He notices Emu and Nene are still recovering and trying to look at their surroundings. He also looks around, trying to get his bearings.
He turns away from the stage and is greeted with darkness, it’s all that surrounds them, the only light source is coming from the stage, the light coming from it is almost like a beacon, something that guides the lost.
He faces back around towards the piano that sits under the warm glow of the spotlight, the only thing decorating the stage are the velvet curtains drawn aside, and bright blonde hair reflecting the light, almost as if he’s glowing.
He’s sitting on the edge of the stage, his hair covering his face and his hands clutching the edge of the stage like it’s his lifeline. If this is a fragment Sekai, and if it was made by Tsukasa’s feelings, then he needs to get to the bottom of this.
He finds that Tsukasa doesn’t bother with trying to convince them to leave, in fact, he doesn’t say anything at all, like he’s lost in his own thoughts and not noticing that he isn’t alone.
This is it, he can finally get the answers he needed, and he will do whatever it takes to help Tsukasa, there’s no more running away.
He finally takes a step forward, “Tsukasa-kun.” He says in a firm, yet warm tone. Tsukasa looks up and locks eyes with Rui, he has an unreadable expression on his face, he doesn’t look angry, just defensive, like he’s on his last line of defence.
“Why did you follow…?” He speaks in an uncharacteristically soft voice, his hands still gripping the edge of the stage where his knuckles turn white.
“Why wouldn’t we follow? We’re worried, you know that right?”
“WELL YOU SHOULDN'T BE.” He snaps, his eyes are glossed over, like he’s on the verge of breaking. He finally hops off the stage to stand in front of it now. He looks down, away from everyone’s piercing stares.
To the others, this scene is painful. It hurts watching someone you deeply care about in pain. To Tsukasa, it’s like standing on the edge of a cliff. He can stop talking now, before he says something he shouldn’t, and back away from the edge. Or he could take a leap. He doesn’t know if he would fly, soar the skies like a phoenix, or fall. He would fall and die, no one to save him.
Rui looks back towards the girls. Emu obviously looks concerned, and she takes a step forward.
“Tsukasa-kun…” Nene lightly places her hand on her shoulder and looks back towards her. She stops advancing. It’s not the right time yet.
Tsukasa speaks up again, “You shouldn’t be here.” This place feels like a cruel joke. It’s like his heart was ripped open for everyone to see, his pride and shame fighting for control, only for the shamefulness to win. Ugly black sludge showing its face for everyone to see, to witness something he's never shown anyone.
None of them should be here to see him in this state. None of them should’ve seen him like this at all, clearly he wasn’t good enough to even do that simple task.
“What did you mean by what you said back there?”
“What? You mean how I'm so useless?! A failure as an actor?! When everyone is leagues ahead of me?! I don’t understand how you kept me around as long as you did.” He looks up, and seemed to fail to notice how close Rui got to him. “I’ll never- be a star like this.”
Right now it’s just him and Rui. He’s teetering on the edge of that cliff, he’s so close to falling. He could back out now, leave and say nothing else, no one would have to worry anymore; or he could take that risk and jump in the hopes that things get better.
He looks up towards Rui, he can barely make out his face through his blurred eyes.
“Tsukasa-kun.” Rui suddenly wraps his arms around his shoulders, Tsukasa’s face buried into his chest. He takes the jump, and soon starts sniffling. Those small sniffles turn into sobs. He starts shaking in Rui’s arms as the grip around his shoulders gets tighter.
He can’t see, but his hands make their way to the front of Rui’s shirt, his grip tightens as his knuckles turn white from clenching so hard. His hot tears are soaking Rui’s shirt, but he doesn’t seem to mind.
Tsukasa’s legs start trembling more, Rui notices and slowly lowers the both of them to a sitting position on the ground. Rui takes one of his hands and starts carding it through Tsukasa’s hair and starts whispering little reassurances.
He eventually starts calming down, like his eyes have run dry and have no more tears to shed.
His breathing slows down a little bit, and Rui takes this time to start talking. “Do you think you could talk now?” he says in a soft tone.
Tsukasa pulls his head away from Rui and looks up at him, his eyes still red from crying. They stay silent for a little bit, Rui content with just comforting Tsukasa while he figures out what to say.
He moves his hand from the blonde’s hair to hold his face, Tsukasa almost instinctively leans towards the warmth.
He takes a breath, his voice still slightly shaky, “I try so hard… I want to make the best shows possible… but it’s hard. I could be doing so much better, I know I can do better, I just want our shows to be perfect… no matter how hard I try or how long I practice, it always seems like everyone can do what I can’t.”
Rui doesn’t immediately respond to him, was saying all of that the right thing? Is he going to see how pathetic he is and leave for good? He took the leap, and he fell… “Tsukasa-kun…?”
Rui’s voice is so soft, why is he saying his name like that?? Shouldn’t he be talking about how Tsukasa was right?
“I want you to know this. No one is perfect. Not you, not me, not Emu-kun or Nene, not even world famous actors will ever be perfect. So please don’t compare yourself with them. You work so hard just as you are now, and I know you’ll get so much better. We are all here to help you remember?” Rui tilts Tsukasa’s face upwards towards his own. “I know you aren’t one to openly talk about things like these, but please, let us in, and let us help you.”
Tsukasa looks like he’s on the verge of tears again, he starts trembling in Rui’s arms again. Tsukasa takes a deep breath before he begins again with his voice still slightly raspy, “I know everyone says you shouldn’t compare yourself like that, but, it’s hard not to when that’s who I want to be. I just- want to make everyone smile. Sometimes I don't know if it’s even worth it to keep going… it’s so hard and it comes so easy for everyone.”
“Yes. That is a part of theatre, you remember your acting type, right?” Tsukasa glances away but Rui gently guides his eyes back to his own.
“Yeah?”
“You’re a method actor, of course it’s going to be difficult for you, some actors like Sakurako-san are able to get in character very easily. But that’s what makes you different, and unique. You approach these difficulties head on, and one thing I admire so much is your ability to not back down.”
“But-“ Tsukasa speaks in a whisper, as much as his normally boisterous voice is able to, yet is cut off by rui once again.
“Those hardships that come with being a method actor are difficult, yes. But don’t you agree that overcoming those challenges is a beautiful thing? You work so hard to perfect your role, you act with everything you have on stage, up until the curtain call, you take your final bow and watch all those smiling faces in the crowd. Isn’t that the greatest thing an actor can experience?”
All of those hard performances like Torpe and Rio all come to mind. Putting in so much effort, pouring all your emotions and feelings into your performance, it acts almost as a sort of catharsis.
But looking out into the audience, seeing the smiling faces on everyone in the audience, it really is everything they work for.
“Yeah, It really is.” Those smiling faces are the reason he’s here right now, acting with everyone.
“I also want you to know this.”
“Huh..?”
Rui’s hold on Tsukasa doesn’t loosen at all, “I want you to know that even if you think you aren’t good enough, I see the opposite. None of us think about you like that. You make mistakes, and that’s okay. What you do with those mistakes is what makes you shine so brightly. You always tackle them head on, you adjust where things need to be adjusted, you adapt to changes. That’s where other actors may fail where you succeed. That’s why you always shine so brightly on stage. And you already have fans. Me, Emu-kun, Nene, Saki-kun and Aoyagi-kun all care about you.”
Rui relaxes more into the hug, shoving his face into the crook of Tsukasa’s neck. “I don’t know where I would be without you, we really admire you, you shine so brightly on stage it’s like something I could get lost in forever…”
Tsukasa starts tearing up into Rui’s shirt again, but instead of painful cries, they are more like a gentle stream of tears. He’s just letting those pent up emotions out as Rui continues to rub his back in gentle circles with his other hand in his hair again.
The backlight from the stage shines off his hair, which makes him seem even brighter.
Eventually Tsukasa pulls back, and Rui lifts his head up to see him. They didn’t notice when the girls approach them.
Emu stops down beside them and wraps her arms around Tsukasa. “How will we put on wonderhoy shows if Tsukasa-kun doesn’t feel wonderhoy himself?”
Nene sits down on the opposite side of them all, she gently places her hand on Tsukasa’s shoulder, “I’m sorry for pushing you back at the arcade.” Her voice ends up much quieter at the last part in her sentence as she avoids eye contact with him.
He knows she means it.
There’s warmth all around him, like he’s being shielded from the cold emptiness of the Sekai. He melts under all of their touches until Rui pulls away from their embrace.
His hands slide down to Tsukasa’s arms, a sudden jolt of pain makes its way up his forearms. Ah, yeah he forgot about that part.
The sudden pain makes him jolt back a little, which doesn’t go unnoticed by Rui, the ever perceptive one. His eyes widen a little, almost like he knows without having to ask directly. Maybe he will bring it up later, if Tsukasa would be okay with it.
He doesn’t want to put him under more stress than he needs to at this moment, content with how far they’ve gotten right now, he doesn’t want to make him talk about it if he isn't ready yet.
“If you ever feel like this again then I want you to tell us. Don’t keep it to yourself, let us help you, alright?” He speaks in that soft tone again, his voice is so smooth that it could comfort anyone, but to Tsukasa, it feels grounding. It’s like a beacon; something that will guide him if he ever gets lost.
He pauses, “I’ll try.” It’s all he can say, he can’t promise that he’ll do it, but he wants to try, if not for himself then for the others.
It’s hard to break habits like these, and he doesn’t want to lie and promise something he might not be able to do. It almost comes naturally to him to not bother others with his problems, but it might be worse if he doesn’t say anything at all. So he’ll try.
There’s relief that washes over Rui as his face contorts from a concerned one to a relaxed one. His golden eyes show a fondness and warmth that Tsukasa really missed.
He lets his head fall back into Rui’s chest Rui moves his hand again to the back of his head and just holds him. “I’m sorry for pushing you today.” Rui mumbles into the top of his head.
“Hmm?” He looks up to Rui again.
“This was something you clearly didn’t want to talk about, and it got to the point where we had to push you to talk. I never wanted to go against your boundaries, so I apologize.”
Tsukasa’s eyes widen a little at him, “No! It’s understandable, I was the one who wasn't talking about it and made you all worry-”
“Hey, what did we talk about? Don’t blame yourself. Sometimes we have thoughts like that and sometimes we find ourselves in hard spots. But don’t blame yourself.” He cards his fingers through Tsukasa’s soft hair again and he lets out a sigh and closes his eyes in content at the feeling.
“Yeah, alright.” Tsukasa lets out a yawn, figuring that they all went into Sekai when the sun was down, it should be pretty late by now.
“Oya~ Is my star tired?”
“Mmmm maybe.”
“Then how about we leave this place?” Rui grabs his hands and helps lift Tsukasa up to his feet, intertwining their fingers together and Rui giving their hands a squeeze.
He then pulls out his phone as their vision turns white.
When he said he was going to try to get better, he meant it. And there’s someone else he also owes it to, to try and improve. That’s why he now stands outside the door to Saki’s room, Rui stands a little farther back so as to not disturb the two of them.
Rui said that he didn’t need to start right away, and to give it some time until Tsukasa felt ready to talk about it again, but Tsukasa insisted on doing it now, saying that doing it now would be easier, especially if Rui is there too.
The last time he saw Saki was back at the arcade, that time he ran away. He probably ended up worrying her a lot, Toya too.
He takes a deep breath in while his hand hovers over the door. Why is he nervous? He shouldn’t be nervous, she’s his sister! She would understand right? He should just do it now while he’s still in the mood to talk about this.
He knocks on the door, a little louder than he would’ve liked, he hears some shuffling through the other side of the door and after a little while it opens. When Saki realizes it’s Tsukasa her eyes widen, yet she doesn’t say anything.
Tsukasa instead speaks up first, “Saki, I need to talk to you about something.”
“Are you finally going to tell me what’s going on?” Her tone has a sadness in it that Tsukasa hasn’t heard before, or maybe he just never realized it until now. He doesn’t want to tell her everything, that’s something he can’t do.
He’s never done that with her, she always had her own problems to deal with and she shouldn’t have to be burdened with his own. But maybe he can let her in, just a little bit; it’s a start at least.
“Yeah.” She looks past Tsukasa and spots Rui behind him, he nods at her and brings her eyes back to Tsukasa.
“Okay, tell me.” She stands out of the way of the door to allow Tsukasa to enter. She sits on her bed with a solemn expression, but her eyes look hungry for answers. He sits down next to her and now that he’s here, he doesn’t really know exactly where to start.
Saki seems to understand and starts the conversation herself. “So… what happened at the arcade? You just suddenly left without saying anything. Nene-chan was there and I asked her what happened, but she took Emu-chan and left. Did you have a fight?”
“Ah, well she just said something to me, something I didn't really want to hear.” He wants to choose his next words carefully, he doesn’t want to tell her everything yet. “Rui and the others found me and talked to me about it.” Saki fiddles with the ends of her hair. and her concerned look back on her face. “We had a talk and now things are better.”
“Are you going to tell me what happened or just keep avoiding it?! We aren’t kids anymore, and I want you to rely on me too. We’re supposed to be there for each other right?” They both look down towards the ground, but she might be right. It feels a bit weird having her being the one to look after him, but she’s older and stronger now.
She sighs, bringing him back from his thoughts. “If you can’t, or don’t want to, talk about it then alright. But can you at least tell me if everything will be okay?”
He looks at her with a big grin on his face, “Yeah. I think so.”
A smaller smile creeps its way onto her face as the tension she had dissipates. “Okay well, I’m glad, but it’s getting late and I know how strict you are with your sleep schedule.” She seems a lot happier, she bounces off her bed and grabs his hands to pull him up with her. She still wants to be let in, but this is a start.
She leads him to the door as they say their good nights and she closes her door, he finds Rui still waiting in the same spot he was in. “So, did you tell her?”
“I tried, I know I should rely on her more but it’s hard.” Rui hums in agreement, “Yes I wouldn’t be surprised. This isn’t something you do everyday so it might take some time. But I'm proud of you.”
“I want to tell her more, but I don’t think I’m there just yet. But anyways, it’s dark out and I’m not going to let you walk home by yourself so we are having an impromptu sleepover!” He places his hands on his hips and beams at Rui. It’s like someone switched a flip in his brain, that scene from before when he cried doesn’t feel like the same person anymore.
“Hehe, alright then, I’m always happy to spend the night with Tsukasa-kun.” Tsukasa flushes and grabs his hand and leads him to his room. Rui sits on his bed as Tsukasa goes to his closet to dig out some spare clothes for Rui to change into.
He has a few oversized shirts and pants that would probably seem to fit Rui, so he tosses them at him. “Wow, so cruel Tsukasa-kun. You could’ve really hurt me by throwing these at me and kicking me out of your room. Sob sob.”
“Just hurry up and get changed!”
“Fufu, alright.” He leaves to the washroom to get changed, Tsukasa also finds some more comfortable clothes and decides to check his phone in the meantime. He hasn’t opened it since he went into Sekai, and what greets him are texts from Nene, Emu, Rui and Saki. Hopefully he’s cleared up at least some things with Saki.
He doesn’t realize when Rui walks back into the room and already made his way into the bed, holding the covers up and signaling Tsukasa to get in too. He shuffles over to the bed and gets in as Rui immediately wraps his arms around Tsukasa. He can feel his warm breath on the back of his neck.
He can feel his eyelids getting heavier as sleep overtakes him. “By the way, you can come back to practice now.”
“Hmm?”
“You said something earlier that I haven’t stopped thinking about, I never had the chance to talk about it. You said something about being benched from practice and about how you thought you were going to get kicked out? I never wanted to kick you out; my hopes were that you would take that time to take a break, but that wasn’t what you needed.”
Tsukasa looks over his shoulder at Rui who dug his face into his back. “So, I can practice with everyone again?”
“Hehe, yes of course.” Rui takes one of his hands and swipes some of Tsukasa’s bangs out of his face and plants a kiss onto his cheek.
With that, their breathing slows down as they both get lulled to sleep, the events of the day now a memory. Maybe things really can get better.
“Look! Look! I told you!” Miku bounds over towards a pile of rubble. There were some cracks on the ground and a few flowers with various colours sprouting from the ground. They were singing a song, it was some old nursery rhyme.
“Ah, so it is true.” Kaito also makes his entrance behind Miku.
“Yeah! I heard singing coming from over here so I went to go see!”
“This place has gotten a lot livelier lately.” Kaito directs his gaze onto a few plushies that were chasing each other around some other piles of debris.
“Ah- hey be careful around that!” Kaito calls out to the plushies, even the sky is more saturated now.
He’s going to have to thank the others later, once they get this place cleaned up.