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He put that look back in Niisan’s eyes.
Filled his eyes with sympathy and worry Ritsu knew the man didn't deserve.
Ritsu regretted having Gimcrack find this sorry excuse for a hero almost immediately after they’d brought him home. He might have rescued Niisan, but it didn’t mean Ritsu trusted him. As far as he could tell, he wasn’t much use to anybody. Not much more than skin and bone, perpetually sick, nervous, jumping at shadows, a stuttering, useless mess. How he managed to get Niisan out of that place, he would never understand.
But he made Niisan smile, made him feel safe, put him at ease, painted worry onto his face whenever he looked particularly pathetic, and Ritsu hated it. Even as they slowly built back up their relationship, Niisan always looked for Reigen and Reigen was always close. A small part of him could admit he was jealous but he wanted to be the one Niisan turned to for help, why wasn’t he enough? Why did Niissan need this stranger in their lives?
Every time he saw them together laughing quietly, talking softly, just existing in the same space together it filled his mouth with ash. It didn’t help that Gimcrack kept feeding him bits of information, putting holes in the man's story so easily it was a wonder any of them fell for it in the first place. How could they not see it? This man had probably helped keep Niisan there, a willing vessel for evil.
Maybe it was all just an act and he was just waiting for an opportunity to take Niisan away from them again. Ritsu couldn’t take that risk.
His parents weren’t doing anything about it, they didn’t seem to see him as any sort of threat, but Ritsu knew sometimes the most seemingly innocent things could be the most dangerous.
So he watched, biding his time for the right moment. Cataloging his weak spots and waiting for the right time to strike, when he knew he could do the most damage, sever the connection to Niisan in one blow.
It was the only way to protect him.
His opportunity came just a few weeks after they’d brought him home. Ritsu could tell he wasn’t feeling well, hadn’t been for a few days, and knew it made him unstable, more emotional than usual. He also knew he doted on Niisan as much as he was able, made sure to watch out for him, do what he could to help even as it cost him. But it still didn’t make him safe.
He had to go.
“I don’t trust you.” He’d corned Reigen in the kitchen. Niisan was standing behind him a ways off, watching silently, and Ritsu kept his tone light and low, even a half smile on his face. “You can never pay us back, so why keep taking?” He saw the hit land, Reigen looked stricken, eyes wide in his pale face, holding his wrist with one hand and rubbing at those terrible scars. Ritsu pushed forward, his words like carefully aimed knives. “You have to realize that you’re just putting Niisan’s health more at risk. How do you expect him to get better if he’s always worried about you?” Another terrible blow, Reigen was shaking now, horrified understanding flooding his face. “It’d be better this way. You can just walk away, I won’t say anything. You can go live your life and stop ruining ours.”
He’d left him there, standing alone in the kitchen, walking away knowing he was doing the right thing, he was protecting Niisan, and in time he would understand that.
Reigen was quiet at dinner, unable to eat much of anything but Ritsu knew that wasn't unusual. His eyes narrowed as Niisan noticed and he comforted him with a soft touch. Scoffing, he left the table, he couldn't handle the scene in front of him. Niisan deserved to be comforted, he shouldn't have to waste his energy on this fake. His mom followed, demanding to know what game he thought he was playing and he couldn't help the vitriol flooding out of his mouth. It was nothing she hadn't heard before.
“Ritsu, he's been through something terrible, just like Shige. He’s got no one else. We have to help him.” She placed both palms on his shoulders and he shrugged them off. “He brought your brother back to us. This is the very least we can do.” Red washed over his vision.
“How do we even know that?” A heated whisper, “for all we know he was keeping him in that house, this could all be an act!” His mother shook her head sadly.
“I know you don't mean that.”
“Then you don't know me at all.” He turned to stalk out of the kitchen throwing an angry glance at the table. Reigen was gone.
He’d been woken by his mom shouting frantically for his dad and run downstairs to find Niisan staring at a familiar folded sheet. Staring at it blankly while his mother tried without success to get him to respond, finally settling on just pulling Niisan into a tight, desperate hug.
It had worked.
Reigen was gone.
But he had taken part of Niisan with him.
He suspected his mom had some idea of what he'd done. He caught her staring at him, disappointment warring with sadness on her face when she thought he wasn’t looking.
Ritsu heard his parents whispering at night when they thought he was in bed, worried for Niisan’s health, wondering where Reigen had gone, why he’d left, if he’d be back. He knew Niisan would be on the couch, vacantly staring into the dark. Despite being lead to his room at night he always ended up back there, not really sleeping, not really doing much of anything, just barely existing in a world he’d forgotten how to navigate. Ritsu tried to pull him out of whatever dark place he had gone, but he wasn't enough. He would barely respond, just move from room to room as if he were looking for something. Someone, Ritsu corrected. Someone he had taken from him.
Guilt began to grow like weeds, smothering, in his chest. Maybe he’d been wrong. Maybe as much as Reigen had been taking, he’d also been giving. Ritsu had begun following Niisan around the house, making sure he was safe, but he couldn't protect him from whatever the darkness was doing to his mind.
It took two days for Gimcrack to come back, in the middle of the night, with any news. Ritsu’s body was sore down to his bones from paying the greedy spirit out of his own soul but he had to make this right. Niisan was fading slowly to nothing.
“if you want to bring anything back to your precious brother, you’d better hurry.”
For as much time as he’d had, Reigen hadn’t gotten very far. It took barely an hour walking swiftly through the frigid cold. He dug his hands deeper into his pockets. He should have worn a heavier jacket.
He remembered that Reigen didn’t even have one.
He remembered that they’d found him the first time in a tent, with nothing. Under a bridge. That he hadn’t had any life to go back to.
As promised, Gimcrack brought him straight to him, collapsed bonelessly on his back in a dark alley, and Ritsu was suddenly sick to his stomach, thinking the spirit had lead him to a dead man.
“Had he come here to die?”
“What’re you waiting for? He ain’t got much time left in this cold.”
“Get out of here.” Ritsu dropped to knees, “where are his shoes?,” beside the still body, hands hovering uselessly over his barely moving chest.
“Suit yerself, kid.” And, very suddenly, he was alone with his mistakes. Shaking fingers touched a frozen cheek, he had to get him up, get him moving. He didn’t have anything to keep him warm.
Reigen, eyes fluttering open, wheezed painfully as he levered him forward, struggling to breathe, rasping “...Keiji…?” in a strangled gasp. Ritsu’s chest tightened, Reigen sounded like he was drowning, could feel him laboring for air under his hands..
“No, I’m Ritsu.” He whispered, past the lump in his throat, draping his jacket across the thin shoulders. “I’m taking you home.” He pulled the blanket tighter around him. “You need to get up.” The auburn head tipped forward, he was collapsing back again, and Ritsu shook him, hard. “You need to get up.” He repeated, firmly, pulling on his arms, pushing him, until he was standing, barely, against the wall. An hour walk seemed suddenly very far.
Ritsu thought of only one thing as he half dragged, half carried his heavy, staggering burden back home through the chill of the night air, guilt strangling him with icy fingers.
It had been him all along.
He put that look back in Niisan’s eyes.