Archive of Our Own ^beta

It takes Dokuga a week before he can walk without having to support his weight on Tetsujou’s arm. He still stumbles, however, his walk slow and sluggish. His feet drag through the ground and his back slumps forward and it worries Tetsujou to no end. 

Rely on me, he wants to say. I'll support your weight. I'll support everything you have to give me.

He stays silent. The desire to voice these feelings is not new, but the absence of their friends—no, their family—makes them weigh much more than before. What was once a selfish desire to be relied on by the man he… a man he cares about, is now heavy and painful. More words are added to Tetsujou's inner litany of Rely on me, Dokuga, please look my way, Dokuga. His traitorous mind now chants It's only you and I now, Dokuga. We only have each other, Dokuga.

He says nothing, of course. He just walks as close to his companion as he can, an arm slightly outstretched to catch him if he falls. His concern for the only person he has left in the world eats away at him, but he pushes forward. 

Surviving in Hole is not as hard as he thinks it should be. The city isn't thriving, especially not after everything that happened, but the humans there are surprisingly kind. The first day after the monster that used to be their boss was defeated, Dokuga looked like he was on the brink of death. Unsure on what to do, Tetsujou carried an unconscious Dokuga in his arms and stood outside of the first hospital he saw. The building was practically in ruins—but so was the rest of the city. He was wondering if it would be safe to enter when a bald doctor that looked really tired emerged from the building, gave him a long-suffering look, and headed back  inside. At a loss for what to do, Tetsujou stood where he was, cradling a Dokuga that felt too light and too cold close to his body. After a while, the doctor came out of the hospital with a plastic bag that he left at Tetsujou's feet. 

"This hospital only treats magic victims," the doctor said. "I can't help you. Leave."

Tetsujou didn't argue that Dokuga was a magic victim because En's mushrooms had disappeared when they were escaping that hell, only leaving a gaping eye and a stump for a left arm. He shifted Dokuga's weight so he could carry him with one arm and took the bag. It was filled with clean bandages and a miniscule amount of antiseptics. Tetsujou raised his head, shouted 'Thank you!', and left. He found a sturdy bridge on a deserted part of the city and hid under it to patch Dokuga up to the best of his abilities.

It took Dokuga a while to wake up, but when he finally opened his eye, he was so groggy and confused that it took him a good five minutes to find his bearings. He blinked slowly and started moving his remaining hand to go over his bandages, silently examining his wounds one by one. Tetsujou watched him and tears started pooling in his eyes at the empty look of understanding the other man gave him. 

Dokuga's hand stopped when it reached his bandaged eye. A little numbly, he said, "Tetsujou… We match now."

His voice was rough and weak and Tetsujou started crying because he didn't want them to match. He wanted Dokuga to get his eye back. He wanted him safe, he wanted him healthy. Dokuga was still severely injured and if Tetsujou lost him too then there would be no point in surviving anymore. 

But Dokuga is tough. They have spent their lives together so Tetsujou should have known this, but it is still impressive to see him cling to life like it’s natural, like the pain, the hunger and the exhaustion aren’t enough to tempt him to close his eye and never open it again. For the five of them, surviving was always their highest priority. So much has changed, but it seems that this remains the same. 

Finding food is tough, but they have always been hungry. The hollow feeling deep in his stomach is more than familiar, and even though his worry for Dokuga’s state is painful, it is not as painful as the thoughts that plague him as he scavenges for food in Hole. That was the last thing he did with the others before everything fell apart; looking for something to feed their newly transformed boss that they were still foolish enough to believe in—though Tetsujou doubts he still believed in the boss by that point. He had only placed his trust in the faith Dokuga had for the monster that their boss had become. Maybe things would be different if he hadn’t; maybe he would be roaming the streets with all of his friends instead of just one, but he can’t bring himself to regret trusting Dokuga. What happened wasn’t their fault, so blaming themselves will only make things worse for them.

It hurts, though. What happened wasn’t their fault, but they are the only ones left to suffer the consequences. 

And the consequences hurt. 

One of the worst things is the silence. The Cross-Eyes elites hadn't been a ridiculously boisterous bunch, but when five people live crammed into a tiny house it is inevitable for things to get noisy. Tetsujou hadn't truly realized how happy he had been when they lived in Berith inside that house they couldn’t even afford, but now that happiness has been forcibly taken away from him and the loss of it burns. He lov— he cares for Dokuga, but Dokuga is a quiet man whose enthusiasm tends to manifest in a small smile, a shine to his eyes, and a subtle blush. Those traits are nothing short of endearing, but Tetsujou misses the noise. He misses Natsuki's squeals of excitement. He misses the annoying sound of Ton chewing on one thing or the other. He misses the obnoxious laughter of Ushishimada when he beat Saji in a game of cards. He misses it all so terribly and hates himself for staying quiet, for adding into this gloomy aura that envelops him and Dokuga, for not being as bright as his deceased friends always were.

He craves that lighthearted atmosphere. He wants to see Dokuga smile and act silly again really, really badly, but he can't make that happen on his own. Alone, he is nothing. 

They are both silent, quieter than they’ve ever been, but one day Dokuga talks. His condition is stable but still far too weak, and his voice sounds really tired when he speaks. 

"That man," he starts tentatively. "The one with the lizard head…"

Tetsujou frowns because he knows where this is going, but he nods. "The one they called Kaiman. He vanished before En's magic enveloped us." 

"Yes. He…" Dokuga looks down and licks his lips. The spit that now covers them glistens lightly, and the danger it holds makes Tetsujou feel a little lightheaded. "His build, his voice… and his outfit…"

"They were like Aikawa’s," Tetsujou finishes for him. Dokuga nods weakly. "And Aikawa was the boss." 

"And Kaiman should still be alive. Do you… do you think...?"

Tetsujou sighs and looks away. He doesn't want to see Dokuga's face right now. The sheer, almost uncharacteristic emotional nature of his expressions when he talks about the boss has always been painful for Tetsujou to behold. 

"As far as I see it, the boss was a monster," he says. Dokuga is very quiet, so he continues. "I saw him kill our friends, Dokuga. I saw him kill our family." He pauses to sigh again, running a hand through his hair and trying to brace himself for what he’s about to say. He takes a deep breath and looks at Dokuga again. "Do you want him back? Do you want us to find that Kaiman guy?"

Tetsujou expects a yes. He expects that brilliant, unshakable faith in a leader that was never there for them. He expects to have to swallow his pride, his wounds and his rage to help Dokuga find the boss, because he would do anything to see his companion smile again, no matter how much it hurts him. 

But Dokuga says, “I don’t.” He looks at Tetsujou in the eyes, his mouth quirking up into a sad, almost imperceptible grin, and says, “I don’t think I want him back. I was wrong about him.”

“Wrong?” Tetsujou asks, awestruck.

“The boss… he was everything. He gave us everything.” Dokuga gives him a wet chuckle and Tetsujou thinks that he didn’t want him to smile like this. Never like this. “But he also took it away. He… he took them away. You’re right, Tetsujou, he was a monster. H-he probably always was, he probably never cared, and we just— I just took his selfish acts and gave them a selfless meaning that was never truly there. So no, I don’t want him back.”

Dokuga takes a slow, shaky breath. Tetsujou watches him closely and with intent because they have known each other for so long that Tetsujou can just read him. They all could, the Cross-Eyes elites, because as quiet and expressionless as Dokuga can be sometimes, he is also sincere, strangely earnest, and anything but unfeeling. So, before he can stop himself, Tetsujou opens his mouth to ask a question he’s not sure he will like the answer to. 

“But you miss him, don’t you?”

Dokuga gives him a pained look, and Tetsujou can imagine hurt is written all over his own features as well. He holds his gaze regardless, anxiously waiting for a response.

“I… don’t understand the logic behind the boss’s existence,” Dokuga says eventually, “but I do know that the little glimpses of a personality he showed us were probably from the man named Aikawa… or, or Kaiman, maybe, I don’t know, but—”

“Dokuga,” Tetsujou interrupts, frowning, “do you miss the boss?”

Dokuga blinks once, twice, then looks down at his lap. He’s obvious. The nature of his feelings for the boss has always been obvious, yet he acts like it isn't, like no one else knows. But maybe that’s the case, maybe only Tetsujou was aware of it because his eye has always been fixed on the person he lost the other one to protect. 

“Do you hate me for it?” Dokuga asks in a small voice. Like he’s ashamed of missing the boss. Like he wishes he felt a different way. Tetsujou’s already broken heart shatters into even smaller pieces. 

“I could never hate you,” he whispers. “You have to know how much you mean to me, you have to. You, Ton, Saji and Ushishimada, you always… The five of us were always…”

Tetsujou chokes on a sob and he purses his lips, trying to hold it back. A fruitless effort; one look at Dokuga’s face, partially covered by bandages yet still so raw with emotion, so full of pain, and another sob escapes him. He closes his eye and covers his mouth, silently letting more tears fall. 

“Precisely,” Dokuga says, and his voice sounds a little broken too, like he’s barely holding it together. “The boss killed them without a second thought, and you’re angry. I should be angry too. I shouldn’t feel this way. I should have never… Maybe if I had done things differently they would still be— be with us.”

“Whoa, whoa, wait,” Tetsujou says, sniffing and wiping his tears. He has opened his eye to find that Dokuga isn’t crying, but he looks like he wants to, like he needs to. “Their deaths are on him and him alone.”

“But I knew he wouldn’t hesitate in killing us yet I didn’t do anything, I just had faith in him because I needed… I loved how it made me feel to be a Cross-Eye, to work for the boss and be useful to him, and, and…”

“Dokuga,” he warns, dead-serious. His voice sounds harsh to his own ears and he wonders how he manages that when he was sobbing just a few moments ago. “You didn’t kill them. You didn’t kill our friends.”

Dokuga shakes his head. “But it was because I still believed in him that they—”

“You didn’t kill them.”

“If I had just been more careful, if I had just—”

“Please, you didn’t—”

“—been honest and told them what the boss did to Risu, what he did to Natsuki—”

“Dokuga, enough!” Tetsujou cries. Their voices had been gradually rising in volume and he is yelling now, feeling more than a little desperate at the way Dokuga is spiraling down in front of him and not listening to his words at all. “You never hurt our friends, you just wanted to have faith in the man who saved us!”

“But I shouldn’t—”

“Listen to me! Please, just, just listen.” He takes a deep breath, and Dokuga says nothing. He’s pursing his lips as if he’s physically holding himself back from arguing. It’s sort of cute, and for some reason it makes Tetsujou want to cry again. When he continues speaking, he does it softly, wiping the tears that still cling to the corners of his eyes. “I understand, okay? I do. I also miss how being around the boss made me feel. I miss the days where I trusted and admired him. I know… I know we felt differently about him, but I still understand, really. I wanted to have faith too. I could have told the others the truth too. But that doesn’t mean I killed them, right?”

“Right,” Dokuga agrees. “Still…”

“I don’t regret believing in you, even if this was the outcome,” he continues, his voice growing soft. “Even if the boss was the one at the front of your mind, I know we were at the back of it. I know our wellbeing never stopped mattering to you.”

Dokuga blinks slowly. His eye is shining, and the stare he is giving Tetsujou is strong and focused, as if he’s seeing him properly for the first time in his life. 

“Tetsujou…” he murmurs. He says the name slowly, deliberately, and because Tetsujou is watching closely—as he always, always is when it comes to Dokuga—he sees the start of tears gathering at the corners of his eyes. It is a rare sight, one Tetsujou has never seen before, and he is as relieved as he is sad. 

“I miss them,” Tetsujou continues. “I’ll always miss them. But we still have each other, okay? A-and I want us to stick together,” he adds, looking down as he feels his cheeks heating up with embarrassment at the feelings he's always been too afraid to voice, “if you… want me by your side.”

“I do,” Dokuga replies. His lack of hesitation is a spark of warmth in Tetsujou’s chest. “I do, Tetsujou.” 

“Thank you,” he breathes.

“You too.”

Tetsujou nods, a little shocked about being thanked and a little upset at himself for being so surprised. Dokuga was never cold, he has always cared for his friends and his clouded judgement when it came to the boss doesn’t take away from that. Tetsujou looks at the tears that never fall from the other man’s eye and watches them dry up with a tinge of sadness. He still can’t help but be relieved that they were there at all.

They don’t speak for the rest of the day. The silence isn’t uncomfortable, Tetsujou just thinks they have exhausted everything that they had to say. Dokuga is still injured and tired and his eye closes eventually. Tetsujou keeps watching him, focusing on the even rise and fall of his chest, clinging to that unmistakable sign of life. Eventually, he gets sleepy as well and scoots over to sit next to Dokuga. They have always huddled for warmth when they sleep outside, but it feels different now. It feels intimate to press his side against Dokuga’s and feel the heat radiating from his body. It feels more intense, it feels like survival. 

It feels like an anchor rooting Tetsujou to a life without his family, a life where he and Dokuga are alone, but together. 

Tetsujou closes his eye and sleeps. 

Dokuga and Tetsujou decide to stay in Hole. Hole isn’t their home, but it is the place where they lost their friends and it feels wrong to leave them behind. Besides, the magic world has never been kind to them. Spending time and energy to find an unlikely way to get back to the place they were born in doesn’t feel like a worthy gamble. 

Dokuga has stopped letting Tetsujou see his wounds, which must mean that they aren’t healing well under the bandages. They don’t have a consistent method of getting food either, and taking odd jobs isn’t a viable option for Dokuga when, unused to his missing limb and still convalescent, he can barely keep his balance. Tetsujou doesn’t want to leave him alone either, not in such a fragile state, so all they can do is walk through the streets of Hole begging for food or money. They have never begged before, but it isn’t as humiliating as one would expect. Natsuki once told them that their sense of pride was skewed, that powerful Cross-Eyes like them should mind doing odd jobs with awful salaries, but Tetsujou never agreed with her. Their little friend group had always been poor and starving, and pride has never kept anyone fed. If they have to beg, they will do it, if they have to exploit Dokuga’s disability to get sympathy hand-downs from strangers, they won’t hesitate to do it. Survival is what matters now. 

But begging can only get them so far, and Tetsujou is becoming increasingly worried about Dokuga’s injuries. They aren’t bleeding through the bandages, but they have started to smell. An infection could be lethal now. It could take away the only person Tetsujou has in the world, and he wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. He considers selling the magic carpet he stole from the En Family, but he doesn’t think any medicine he pays for will do the trick. He needs healing smoke and getting that in Hole is nearly impossible. There is literally nothing he can do and no one he can ask for help. He considers the member of the En Family that spared their lives, but he doubts he will ever get the chance to approach him again. He then considers Risu, but how could he help, what resources could he have? He isn’t even their friend, just a fellow Cross-Eye that got screwed over by the boss. Nothing can change the fact that Dokuga and Tetsujou are utterly alone in the world.

Or so he thought. Luck strikes one day while they wander through the streets of Hole, luck being a tall man with a lizard head that they are both familiar and unfamiliar with. They bump into him by chance when he’s walking walking with a woman. Tetsujou tenses up and instinctively reaches for the place where his sword would be. It got lost along his body when he got diced up in Hole so his hand meets nothing and he grits his teeth. Kaiman isn’t looking at him though, his eyes, barely visible through his mask, are on Dokuga. Through the corner of his eye, he can see Dokuga’s uncertain expression, his eye wide and shining. Another one of those rare expressions reserved for the boss alone. 

Tetsujou shouldn’t get distracted, but it still hurts to see. No matter what, it’s always for the boss. He can wish for it all he wants, but it’ll never be for him. 

“Aren’t you guys…?” the woman standing next to Kaiman starts. She’s familiar too, Tetsujou believes she was turning into a demon while they were all in Hole, but his attention is pulled away from her when Kaiman throws something at their feet.

Both Dokuga and Tetsujou startle, but it is only a glass cylinder with something dark inside. Dokuga bends down to pick it up and Tetsujou wraps an arm around his back, supporting his weight when he stands back up.  

Dokuga raises the cylinder to examine it, and he murmurs, “Isn’t this…?”

Black smoke. Tetsujou turns around, but Kaiman is already leaving. The woman looks back at them, offers a shrug and a smile, and trots to catch up to her friend. 

“Do we trust that it’s healing smoke?” he asks. Dokuga brings it closer to his face, squinting a little. 

“No way to tell,” he replies. “I can’t think of a reason why he would give us any other kind.”

“I can’t think of a reason why he’d give us healing smoke either,” Tetsujou argues, frowning. “We are nothing to him.”

“Maybe he feels like he owes it to us. Not that I would know what he’s thinking.”

Tetsujou sighs. “Listen, I know we’re in no position to be wary about handouts, but I’m worried that it’ll make things worse. That it’ll hurt you more.”

“But if we don’t do anything about my wounds I’ll die soon. I don’t think I have much of a choice.”

He’s right, and Tetsujou knows it, but… “I’m scared, Dokuga.”

“I know.”

“I don’t want to lose anyone else.”

“I know.” Dokuga reaches for the bandages covering his face and gives Tetsujou a considering look. “Turn around.”

“Why?”

“I don’t want you to see my wounds.”

A part of Tetsujou wants to argue that Dokuga is doing this too fast, but he does as he’s told. He knows that if they don’t use the smoke immediately then they will hesitate, and if they hesitate the wounds might get worse and worse. It’s terrifying, looking at a run-down building and hearing a faint rustling behind him, not knowing if he’s about to lose the man he— the only man left in his life, but he stays rooted to the spot, clenching his fists so hard his gloves make an audible sound. 

“Do you need any of the smoke?” Dokuga asks from behind him. Tetsujou shakes his head. “Alright then.”

There is a muted noise of the cylinder being uncapped, and then nothing. The silence must have lasted only a second or two, but it feels like ages before the noise of what can only be flesh moving begins. It doesn’t last for long; the smoke must be from a powerful magic user, considering how fast it acts. 

There are no grunts of pain or any other concerning sounds coming from Dokuga’s mouth but Tetsujou is still too scared to turn around and look when the noise stops. He stands there, barely breathing, and then he gets tapped on the shoulders. Both shoulders at once, with two different fingers. Tetsujou turns so fast he gets a little dizzy, and Dokuga as he always knew him greets him. Two arms, two eyes, and no signs of imminent death in his features. 

“We don’t match anymore,” Dokuga comments, pointing to his left eye, and Tetsujou feels his knees go weak with relief. He feels himself falling but Dokuga supports his weight. 

He’s healthy. Solid. Sturdy as he always was. Tetsujou could cry. 

“I hope we never do again,” he breathes, clinging onto his companion’s arms. 

Things get better so fast it’s almost disconcerting. They finally sell the magic carpet and buy new weapons to be able to defend themselves a little better. Tetsujou gets a job in a small construction company and helps rebuild the damage that was done to the city during the fight against Hole, the entity. Dokuga gets a job as a delivery man. Both of those pay less than the work they did at the Berith Inn, but they have less mouths to feed. The first thing they do with the money is get a small room at an old apartment in the shittiest part of town. A single room and a single bathroom, but more than enough for the two of them. 

They share the bed. It’s a tight fit and they only have a thin blanket so they tend to inch closer to each other while they sleep. The first morning they wake up tangled up in one another, practically hugging in their sleep, Tetsujou thinks that his heart shouldn’t start pounding out of his chest just because of that. They’ve known each other since they were kids, they’ve slept huddled together before, but that was always with more people in the pile. Being sandwiched between Dokuga and Ton with Ushishimada’s snores keeping him awake and Saji’s habit of kicking in his sleep doing an even better job at that cannot compare to the intimacy of waking up with Dokuga in his arms. It’s more than a little embarrassing, but Tetsujou likes to think that he plays it cool. The sadness that comes with the thoughts of his late friends helps him calm down and say a casual goodbye to Dokuga when they part to go to their respective jobs. 

They don’t see each other much during the day, but that’s okay. Things used to be like that back when the Cross-Eyes were still in action, so the only difference is coming home to an empty house rather than one bustling with noise and laughter. That’s the worst part, coming home and being met with only silence and coldness. His schedule often ends earlier than Dokuga’s, and Dokuga has come home to find him crying more than a couple of times. He doesn’t cry with Tetsujou but he does sit down next to him, presses their shoulders together, and tells him about his day. It took him a bit to figure out why Tetsujou hated silence so much, but once he finally did he started speaking more than he ever did before. It’s awkward sometimes, as Dokuga isn’t naturally talkative and he doesn’t know what to say half the time, but the fact that he’s trying is more than Tetsujou could ever ask for. 

“Thank you,” he tells him one day after Dokuga finishes an incredibly boring tale of him finding a coin on the sidewalk.

“What for?” Dokuga asks. Tetsujou shakes his head. 

“You don’t have to do this for me, but you do it anyway. I appreciate it.”

Dokuga gives him a considering stare, his eyebrows slightly creased. He looks down at his hands and stops his work; he’s been mending a big hole in his pants but he’s not quite as skilled with a needle as Saji was. It looks really bad, but Dokuga is doing his best so Tetsujou says nothing about it. 

“I’m not heartless,” Dokuga says eventually. “I can’t just ignore what makes you hurt.”

“I know you aren’t, it’s just… You really used to keep your distance, you know?” Tetsujou smiles lightly when his… his friend looks at him. “I get why you did it, don’t worry. Even if the organization and the boss were your priority, you never stopped wanting to keep us safe.”

Dokuga nods and looks back at his handiwork, twisting the needle he’s holding between his fingers. “But things are different now that we only have each other.”

Tetsujou feels his chest warming at Dokuga’s words. He feels sympathy, an understanding of the loneliness and discomfort of their lives without their friends in it, but he’s also strangely flattered. If Dokuga acknowledges that they only have each other, that confirms that he needs Tetsujou as much as Tetsujou needs him. There is a reciprocation in those words that makes him feel lightheaded with something that he’s always wanted but never had. 

Back when the boss had disappeared, Tetsujou often worried that, with him gone, Dokuga would leave too. The man had put so much of his being and his purpose into the boss that Tetsujou feared he would disappear on them too. He thought that Dokuga would find no meaning in a life without the first man that made them believe that they were worthy of more than a miserable death on the streets. All the Cross-Eyes admired their boss, but Dokuga’s admiration bordered on devotion, sometimes even obsession, and the intensity of those feelings always scared Tetsujou. There was a life before the boss, but would there be a life after him?

He’s glad that the answer is yes. He would be much happier if that answer didn’t come with the loss of the rest of their friends, but he has started to accept that there is nothing he can do about that anymore. Within all the loneliness and misery, he takes comfort in seeing Dokuga’s attention be directed at someone other than the boss. If that someone is him, if that attention helps him accept the loss of the others, if being cared for by Dokuga makes him feel selfishly happy, then he keeps that to himself. 

He tries his best not to acknowledge them, but there has been a pool of feelings inside him that has been growing and festering for a long, long time. He’s been keeping them bottled up, repressing them in any way he can for as long as they first took shape, but the satisfaction that comes with Dokuga’s eyes on him, with his efforts to make him feel better, are really fanning the flames that those feelings are. They’re getting harder and harder to ignore. 

“Tetsujou?” Dokuga calls, snapping him out of his train of thought. “You’re staring.”

“Oh, sorry.” He scratches the back of his neck, feeling a little guilty about the things he was thinking about. “Just lost in thought.”

“You okay? Should I talk more?” Dokuga asks, the genuine concern in his features making Tetsujou feel even guiltier. 

“No, no, don’t worry,” he tells him, waving a hand. He clearly doesn’t have anything else to say for the day, so Tetsujou decides to fill the silence himself. “You know what? I saw the giant cockroach again today when I was walking home.”

Dokuga’s eyes widen with interest. “No kidding. I really wonder what that thing is.”

“I think I heard it speak. It said ‘shocking’.”

“Then it must be a magic victim, right?” Dokuga starts tapping the point of his needle on the table, making little holes into the wooden surface as he thinks. “But I don’t get if it’s a human victim or a cockroach that was just... made large.”

“Would a giant cockroach be able to speak though?” Tetsujou asks with a smile. 

Dokuga shrugs. “Stranger things have happened.”

“You’re right,” Tetsujou laughs. He hears how his own laughter fills the small space of their room and realizes that he likes this better. Not Dokuga trying to comfort him on his own but their voices combined, filling their new home with sound. 

Together. 

Life in Hole is surprisingly easy, but Tetsujou is no fool. Being away from the magic world minimizes contact with magic users, but scum will always be scum. Doors to Hole still manifest and magic victims increase, albeit at a slower pace than before. For some magic users, this city is still a place to experiment, to play with the lives of its people as if they have any right to, as if their powers make them superior to those that don’t wield them. 

They don’t. These magic users are pathetic and weak, and when they mistake Tetsujou for a normal inhabitant of Hole and try to attack him when he’s walking home, their throats taste his blade faster than they can scream. He bought this sword to be able to defend himself better but he could take down these worms with his bare hands. 

He looks down at the three corpses bleeding at his feet and grimaces. 

“Disgusting,” he murmurs under his breath before he crouches down to pat their pockets. 

He finds a substantial amount of spare change, a nicer wallet he can give to Dokuga and a new pair of shoes that seem like they would fit him. He considers taking their clothes too, but they are deeply tainted with their own blood. Completely useless. He looks down at his own shirt, finding it stained too and wishing it wasn’t white. Getting the blood out of it will be hell. 

The rest of his walk home is uneventful, but he feels kind of gross. His kills used to be a little cleaner, a little more effortless, but he has gotten sloppy after so long without taking a life. He can’t really tell if he’s glad about that or not; he’s always been able to kill pretty effortlessly, but the last magic user killing spree the boss made them go through completely numbed him to the feeling of driving his sword through someone’s neck. 

The house isn’t empty when he gets there. Dokuga is sitting on the floor, staring at two bowls of rice with fried veggies on the table. 

That’s right, he thinks as he steps out of his dirty shoes and dumps his loot next to the door. It’s Friday.

Their schedules only allow them to have meals together on Fridays and Sundays, but they make the most of those days. Eating meals together with the others was one of the biggest parts of being a Cross-Eye elite; food had always been so scarce for them that Ton continuously insisted that sharing it with others would make the occasion even more joyous. Dokuga’s spit ruins the taste of food for him but he’s always stuck with the tradition anyway, and clinging to it after Ton’s death feels meaningful, like something they cannot abandon. 

“Sorry I’m late,” he apologizes, taking off his hat and unceremoniously throwing it at the bed. 

“What happened?” Dokuga asks, frowning at Tetsujou’s bloodstained shirt. 

Tetsujou sighs, shrugs, and takes his shirt off to drop it on the sink and run some water through it. He’ll deal with the stain later, but he doesn’t want the blood to fully dry on the fabric. He pulls his sword out of his belt and props it against the wall, then stretches his arms over his head.

“Just some magic users that thought I’d be an easy victim,” he says, his voice a little strained when some of his bones crack due to his stretching. He sighs, shakes his head, and turns to sit down in front of Dokuga, scanning their shitty little table until he finds his chopsticks and picks them up. “I was kinda shoddy about downing them though. I didn’t use to stain myself like this.”

“Augh…” 

“Hm?” Tetsujou looks up at Dokuga and finds that the other man is looking at anything but him, his eyes darting all over the place. He’s blushing. His face is really red. “What’s up?”

“Um,” Dokuga says, taking a quick glance at Tetsujou and averting his eyes again. “Put a shirt on?”

“Oh. It’s dirty though.” 

“Then take my hoodie, just. Just put something on.”

Tetsujou can’t help but grin, his bad mood immediately escaping him. He’d forgotten how flustered Dokuga got when he saw naked bodies, he just didn’t expect him to react that way because of him. They’ve seen each other naked countless times before, but maybe the context matters? Whenever they changed clothes in the same room or when they were all in En’s sauna then it was expected of them to be undressed, but he guesses that eating dinner shirtless is a whole different thing. 

Whatever the reason, it’s cute. Dokuga gets really honest when he’s flustered and it’s very, very cute. 

“Aw, Dokuga, it’s just me,” he says, but he gets up anyway. “Where’s your hoodie?” 

“On the bed,” Dokuga replies. “It should fit.”

“It should,” he agrees, shrugging the hoodie on. “We’ve always been around the same size.”

“You might be a bit bigger than me now. You do heavy lifting every day.”

“Your clothes are baggy though.” Tetsujou illustrates this by holding his arms out and moving them, letting the baggy sleeves of Dokuga’s hoodie flap around. He smiles and puts the hood on, pulling it low enough that it covers up to his eyebrows. “I bet I could even pass as you if I do this.”

Dokuga presses his lips together, still a little red in the face. He looks down at their untouched food, then back up. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“I’d have to put the whole mask on, I guess,” he continues, trailing a hand through one of the antennae sown into the hood. “The eye scar is a pretty big give-away.”

“Ah…” Dokuga frowns, giving Tetsujou’s injured eye a long look. “I never apologized for that.”

“For what?”

“Your eye.”

Tetsujou’s eye widens in shock and he instinctively raises a hand to his injured eye. His fingertips touch his scar, feeling the small indentation of skin. He knows his fingers are touching the cross too, but he can’t feel it at all.

“Back then, I chose to get in the way of those scissors,” he says, his voice quiet. “When I got the crosses tattooed I remember looking at a mirror and feeling relieved that they didn’t obscure the scar.”

“Why?” Dokuga whispers. He looks uncertain. Tetsujou doesn’t think that look suits him. 

“Because the organization meant a lot to me, but you always mattered more.” He sits up, leaning his weight on the table to put a hand on Dokuga’s shoulder. He holds his gaze when he says, “I bear this with pride, so please don’t tell me that you’ve been blaming yourself over it.”

Dokuga nods. “Okay, I won’t tell you.”

Tetsujou doesn’t think he’s ever felt so much fondness and exasperation all at once. He squeezes Dokuga’s shoulder and the other man simply takes his wrist, not pulling his hand away but not trying to keep it there either. Skin to skin, Tetsujou feels his pulse quickening.

“Don’t try to find a loophole in my logic now,” he says, trying not to let his seriousness escape him just because Dokuga is touching him and he doesn't know why. “Just don’t blame yourself for it.” 

“That’ll take some effort.”

“Do your best then,” he tells him, slowly pulling away. Dokuga holds onto his wrist until the last moment, dragging his fingers through his hand when they finally break apart. Tetsujou swallows the lump in his throat and says, “I believe in you.”

Inexplicably, Dokuga offers him a small smile. “You always do, don’t you? Thank you.”

“I… what is up with you today?” Tetsujou asks, his heartbeat almost deafening in his ears. “All this gratitude, and these apologies…”

“It’s nothing. I’ve just been realizing many things.” Dokuga shrugs and, before Tetsujou can ask him to clarify, he picks up his chopsticks. “Let’s eat, I’m hungry.”

After Dokuga has put such a clear end to their conversation, Tetsujou doesn’t feel like he can ask anything else. He starts eating his own meal with small bites, running Dokuga’s words and actions through his mind over and over and over again. 

The food tastes like nothing to him. Tetsujou has never felt closer to Dokuga. 

Having a routine is frightening. Tetsujou wakes up one day and finds himself completely used to disentangling himself from Dokuga, getting dressed, and heading to work. He does his job mindlessly, eats his scarce lunch, finishes up, and comes back home. He waits for Dokuga, they have a meal together when he gets there, and they go to bed again. It is such a simple rinse and repeat, a far cry from the crazy life they lived before this. No several odd jobs, just the one. No spontaneous missions, just a simple life with Dokuga. Life is stable. Life isn’t so bad. Tetsujou kind of hates it. After all, getting used to a routine without the friends they lost really cements the fact that they’re gone for good. 

But he’s starting to feel like he’s accepted that too. He still misses them every day, but the mere thought of them doesn’t hurt as much as it did before. That is scary too. He wonders if the fear will ever go away. After experiencing what he did in Hole, he doubts it ever will. 

Dokuga is doing well. He feels a little brighter these days. He doesn’t act very different but he’s somehow warmer, somehow closer. He touches Tetsujou fairly often—nothing scandalous, just a hand on an arm, a shoulder against the other, a brush of his fingers… it’s still a lot, considering how much physical distance he always put between himself and the others. He also looks at Tetsujou a lot, which makes Tetsujou realize how little Dokuga looked at him before. His eyes were always somewhere else; if not directed at the boss then directed somewhere far away. Tetsujou thinks he likes the attention, but he doesn’t know how to act under that gaze. He feels awkward, like he’s living a life he’s not supposed to live, like he’s acting like a person he’s not supposed to be. 

One day, he asks Dokuga if he thinks he’s acting different and Dokuga reassures him that no, he’s the same as always. A little sadder, perhaps, but that’s to be expected. He’s probably being paranoid, but he has these frequent nightmares about Hole. He dreams of Saji and Ushishimada’s severed heads opening their mouths and blaming him for leaving them behind. He dreams of Ton and Natsuki lying together in a pool of blood, their faces contorted into a pained grimace. He dreams of the entity they previously assumed to be their boss floating around the grim halls of the Central Department Store, the tubes protruding from his body carrying a half-dead Dokuga, squeezing his injured body until his flesh tears and his guts start spilling out. He dreams of his friends being murdered in front of his eyes as he lays there without a body, unable to do anything except watch and cry. And then he wakes up in the arms of the man he… the man he loves, the man he has always loved, and he gets to see him awaken and give him a sleepy ‘good morning’ and he gets dressed for a day of work feeling like he’s crazy because why does he get to have this when the others never will? Why does life feel this normal when all of those horrible things happened not even a year ago? 

He hates it. He hates how much he loves his routine, he hates how comfortable living in Hole has become. He hates their shitty apartment and how cozy it feels, he hates having a job he doesn’t loathe with coworkers that treat him like a proper human being, and he hates how Dokuga has changed. He hates the new touches and the frequent gazes and the fact that all of Dokuga’s attention is now directed at him. He hates the hopes all of that gives him, he hates the possibility that the feelings he has been trying to push down his entire life may now be uprooted and have a chance of being reciprocated. Their old lifestyle was painful and always doomed to fail, but he almost wants it back. 

He never felt this guilty back then. He felt pride in reclaiming an existence magic users shunned, he felt like he had every right to be alive. So why is that hard now? Why, when he hasn’t done anything wrong? His friends would want him to be happy. They were all rooting for him, he knows. They could see his feelings clear as day and they approved of them. They wanted him to be happy and he wanted the same for them. 

But maybe that’s the problem. Natsuki was always daydreaming about having her first kiss and Tetsujou wanted her to have it. Saji enjoyed sewing and embroidering a little too much and Tetsujou often thought that, if he ever got a partner, he would make gifts like that for them. Ushishimada was kind of short but he owned it by saying he liked women that were taller than him and Tetsujou always hoped that he would find one that would treasure his short self. Ton was so completely full of love that Tetsujou constantly wanted him to be spoiled and cared for, when their life would allow it. But it never did. Everything ended before it could begin.

Dokuga deserves happiness too though, and Tetsujou knows about what he wished for as well. The longing in his eyes when he looked at the boss, the sad looks when his poison spit came up as a conversation topic. There are things he can do nothing about, but if Dokuga ever wants him to… he has the power to bring some happiness and comfort into his life, he thinks. Maybe that’s why he lives now. Maybe his purpose is to finally make Dokuga realize that he is loved, that he has always been loved. 

Or maybe he’s just conceited and the subtle touches and the not so subtle gazes are only platonic affection and Dokuga is still in love with the boss and he will never fall for a man that isn’t as large as a truck so Tetsujou has no hope because at his age he just cannot grow like forty centimeters taller. 

This is pointless, he thinks, sighing heavily and throwing an arm over his eyes. I don’t even want to be like the boss. 

“What are you doing?” Dokuga asks. 

Spiralling, Tetsujou’s brain supplies, but he doesn’t say it. He lifts his arm just slightly and sees a red-faced Dokuga towelling his hair dry. Tetsujou took an ice cold shower today, intentionally leaving all the hot water for his roommate to use. With the comfortable aura that Dokuga now exudes, he decides that he’ll always take cold showers from now on. 

“I’m tired,” he says after a while, figuring he should at least answer. It’s no lie anyway.

“You’re finally building around the Lake of Refuse, right?” Dokuga asks. He sits on the bed and Tetsujou feels the old mattress dipping with his weight. 

He’s very close and his warmth hits Tetsujou with surprising intensity. Why must he sit so close? Tetsujou feels like he’s going mad.

“I hate being there,” he admits, covering his eyes with his forearm again and breathing a heavy sigh. “But the pay is good.”

“You can afford to quit if it’s too much for you. I… I got a job offer today.”

“Oh?” He lowers his arm to look at Dokuga, who is staring at his own lap with pursed lips. “Are you interested? We don’t need to work a bunch of jobs anymore, but...”

“I… I might be. It’s at the Hungry Bug. Nikaido’s restaurant,” he clarifies when Tetsujou gives him a confused look. “I had a delivery there and she told me she was a bit short-handed now that her restaurant has started taking off, so… she asked me if I wanted to work there.”

Nikaido… Nikaido means Kaiman. He’s a popular guy in town, so even if they haven’t bumped into each other again it’s common knowledge that he’s always hanging out with Nikaido. And Kaiman means the boss and all the complicated feelings that he brings, not only for Dokuga, but for Tetsujou as well—he still hasn’t thanked him for giving them the healing smoke and saving Dokuga’s life, but then again, why thank someone they technically don’t even know?

“Are you sure?”

Surprisingly, Dokuga smiles. It’s a soft smile but his eyes are quite wide and his eyebrows are raised high in what seems like  incredulity. 

“He got mad at me,” he says, chuckling quietly. “It was my last delivery of the day and Nikaido had just finished making a round of gyozas so she offered me some and I ate them. He got mad at me for ‘stealing’ his gyozas, even if they weren’t his to begin with. Then I said that I could barely taste them because of the poison spit and he got even madder. I wanted to take some home for you but he snatched them away. It was so weird… he was fuming, but it wasn’t scary at all. He acted like a child.”

“Huh…” 

“Yeah… I just… he’s not the boss, Tetsujou. He’s childish and stupid and obnoxious, and he’s not the boss at all. The boss is well and truly gone,” he adds, his voice softening into a whisper, his smile changing into something oddly joyous, “and I think that’s a good thing. That we’ll never get him back.”

“But you loved him,” Tetsujou blurts out. He immediately regrets it because that was a fact they never acknowledged. It had never been put into words, and doing so feels wrong, like it’ll make it even more true than it already is. 

He expects Dokuga to deny it, but instead he says: “I did. That’s why it’s good. I can finally move on.”

Tetsujou doesn’t think he’s ever felt this emotionally conflicted. Hearing Dokuga acknowledge his feelings for the boss hurts much more than he would have imagined, but… he’s talking like he’s over them. Like the boss is his past and he is now facing the future.

“Move on?” he asks, sitting up and wrapping his arms around his knees. “Really?”

“Yes. Onto you, maybe. I don’t know.” Dokuga shrugs and looks away, but averting his gaze has given Tetsujou a clear view of his profile; a clear view of the blush that goes from his cheeks to the very tip of  his ears. He stares at the reddened skin in disbelief of what he just heard. “Do you remember when we were dropped into Hole? How happy I was when the rain hurt us? I-I always cared about the lack of magic inside us far too much, I think. That was why I latched so heavily onto the boss, I think, because his existence really catered to my desires. I wanted someone to make me feel like us non-magic users that dwelled in the magic world had dignity.”

“We all felt the same, though,” he interjects, frowning. That gets Dokuga to gaze at him with uncertainty written all over his features, an uncertainty Tetsujou wants to wipe away. “We were all tired of being kicked around. We all hated magic users. We all believed in the boss.” He sighs and buries his head in his knees, rubbing his forehead against them. “I hate myself for it, but I don’t regret being such an important part of the Cross-Eyes. Even if the boss never cared and even if we lost our friends, we still fought for what we believed in. It’s hard to be ashamed of that.”

“I know,” Dokuga replies. “Still… how do I say this? You always put your friends before the organization, and I did just the opposite. I… I thought that living in Hole would be humiliating, you know? This was the place where we were thrown into and all. I felt like settling happily in this city would be like giving up. But it’s helped me realize so many things, this different life.”

The words Dokuga said before echo in Tetsujou’s mind. Yes. Onto you, maybe, he said when Tetsuou asked him about moving on. He lifts his head and meets Dokuga’s gaze. He’s smiling again, a wobbly, insecure little grin. Tetsujou tries to swallow but his throat is parched. 

“What have you realized?” he asks. His voice sounds rough to his own ears, but he can barely register it with the deafening pounding of his own heart dulling every other sound. 

Dokuga hums, considering, and the few seconds he takes to answer feel like years. 

“Your worth, I think,” he says, and Tetsujou’s heart just stops. “I took you for granted before, but when Kaiman gave us that healing smoke and I realized I wasn’t dying anymore, I decided I would never do that again.” He scratches the back of his head, breaking their eye contact to look around their small apartment. “Life now really is just you and I so, no matter where I look, you’re there. I-I find it hard to look away now. I wish I’d started looking sooner.”

“Why?” Tetsujou asks, breathless, but Dokuga says nothing. The tips of his ears are even redder than before and Tetsujou feels like he’s losing his mind. “What do you mean ?”

“Can’t you tell?”

“Dokuga, I’ve been in love with you for as long as I can remember,” he blurts out. “You can either tell me directly or I’m just gonna assume any romantic implications in your words were my wishful thinking.”

Dokuga takes a sharp breath and finally looks back at Tetsujou, who tries to hold his gaze despite the fact that he’s currently losing it because he said it, he actually said it and he doesn’t think he’s ever regretted saying anything more than this. But… Dokuga’s eyes are bright. They have that sheen of emotion that was only ever there for the boss, but now they’re directed at him. Tetsujou has never felt more overwhelmed than this. 

“Do I deserve you, Tetsujou?” he asks. Tetsujou’s mouth drops, but Dokuga continues speaking before he can even say what? “You’ve been loyal to me for so long, but I… I never was. I was always thinking about the boss and talking about the boss, and you were always there, listening, even though you…”

“But I was never entitled to your love!” he exclaims, pushing his weight forward until he’s kneeling right next to Dokuga. Touching him at this distance would be the easiest thing, but he almost feels afraid to do so. “You’re my friend before anything else, of course I listened! You needed my support, how could I not have listened?” 

Dokuga takes a shaky breath, frowning deeply. “This is exactly what I mean. Why are you so kind? Why did you stay loyal even though I can’t even give you anything that other people could? I can’t kiss you, I can’t do anything for you, I—”

“Who cares about that? I can kiss you, you can touch me, we can just— just be together! All I wanted was to be together, this is already more than I ever thought I could have, so—”

“More than you could have?! I’m not that great!”

“That’s for me to decide!”

There is a loud thud on the wall, followed by an angry “Shut up, I’m trying to sleep!” from their neighbor. They both flinch and stare at each other with wide eyes, breathing hard. Tetsujou realizes how close to Dokuga’s face he has gotten and he slumps back, putting distance between them and resting his back against the wall. The other man covers his mouth, a look of clear worry in his face. He always refrains from yelling to avoid accidentally spitting on someone, but here he was now, raising his voice so close to Tetsujou’s face. He probably feels terrible.

“I’m sorry,” he says, his voice muffled by his hand. 

“It’s okay,” Tetsujou sighs, “I was yelling too.”

“This isn’t how I expected this conversation to go.”

It isn’t how Tetsujou expected it either. He used to entertain the thought of confessing to Dokuga, but the thought always ended with a polite rejection, not a screaming match of mutual love. He runs a hand down his face, still in disbelief.

“Are you sure you love me back?”

Dokuga lowers his hand and nods. He’s serious when he says, “I am. No doubt about it.”

“Come here then?” Tetsujou asks, opening his arms. Dokuga hesitates, but he eventually crawls forward and kneels between Tetsujou’s open legs. “Cover your mouth again.”

Dokuga does as he’s told, putting a hand over his lips, and Tetsujou leans forward and up, pressing his lips against his knuckles, right over where his mouth is. He lingers, letting Dokuga feel the kiss and process it for what it is. After he pulls back, he gently pries the hand away from Dokuga's face, kissing its back again. Dokuga makes a small gasp and Tetsujou leans up once more, kissing his cheek. 

He feels like he's about to burst and die. His face is burning, his heart is going a mile per hour, and he still can't believe this isn't just a dream or a delusion. Thoughts of his late friends pop up again, making the elation he feels at the moment feel kind of bitter. He just kissed Dokuga, who actually told him that his love is reciprocated, but he can't share that with the others. Should he even be doing this in the first place?

But then Dokuga slumps forward, letting all of his weight drop on Tetsujou's chest. Tetsujou’s arms instinctively wrap around him, pulling him closer, and the warmth they share now, chest to chest and wrapped up in one another, chases every other thought away. 

"I wanna do that too," Dokuga whispers against Tetsujou's shirt. 

"Then do it," Tetsujou replies, his voice low. "Put your hand over my mouth." 

“Ah,” Dokuga breathes, wiping his palm on his pants before pressing it against Tetsujou’s lips. He leans forward, kissing him through his hand, and even though he can’t feel Dokuga’s lips at all, Tetsujou closes his eye. Dokuga moves his hand, slowly caressing his face, and soon he uses both hands to run his fingers over Tetsujou’s features. “Tetsujou,” Dokuga says, almost reverently. One of his thumbs lightly touches his right eyelid, tracing the scar there. Tetsujou feels like he could cry, and then Dokuga runs both of his hands through his short hair, from his forehead to his nape. He wraps his arms around Tetsujou’s neck, pulling him into a tight hug that he eagerly returns. 

They’re chest to chest again, so Dokuga can surely feel how fast Tetsujou’s heart is beating. He says nothing, though, and Tetsujou turns his head to press his lips against his neck. Dokuga’s pulse is a rapid, almost fluttering thing under his mouth, so he kisses it again. And again, and again. He kisses Dokuga’s neck until the man is shivering against him and running his hands all over his nape and back, touching him wherever he can reach. He brings his hands back to his hair and buries them there, lightly massaging his scalp.

“This feels good,” Tetsujou says against his skin, closing his eyes and nuzzling his neck.

“Does it?”

“Yeah. Do you feel good?”

“I do,” he replies, burying his nose in Tetsujou’s hair too. “I can’t believe I get to have this.”

Tetsujou’s eye widens and he pulls back to look at Dokuga. His partner gives him a quizzical look, tilting his head just so, and Tetsujou brings a hand up to cup his cheek. 

Has Dokuga been having these thoughts too? Has he been plagued with guilt as well? Does he also think about their friends as much as Tetsujou does, wishing that they could have the life they now enjoy together? He had not realized how lonely he felt with the thoughts that tormented him, but knowing that Dokuga is here as well, feeling the same things that he does, makes him feel so much better. 

It’s company. It’s the feeling of his hollowed heart being filled with warmth again. He cards his hand through the hair at Dokuga’s nape and gently guides his head down so he can give a kiss to each of Dokuga’s eyelids; to each of the crosses that represent the bond and beliefs they shared with their family. He then kisses his forehead too, pulls back, and smiles at the face Dokuga’s making. He looks so sweet, all red-faced with half-lidded eyes. He almost looks ready to cry, but he’s keeping it in. He should cry if he needs to; Tetsujou will be ready to kiss his tears away.

“We can have anything we want,” he tells him. “As long as we’re together.”

“Okay,” Dokuga breathes, cupping Tetsujou’s cheeks and resting their foreheads together. “Okay.”

They walk together to the Hungry Bug. Dokuga could accept the job offer on his own, but he insisted that Tetsujou should come as well. He said that everyone insists the gyozas there are delicious and if Dokuga can’t enjoy their taste then at least he should. Tetsujou couldn’t care less about the gyozas, but he does have a day off and he is curious about Dokuga’s new workplace, so he has no reason to avoid coming with him. 

They walk into a run-down shop and Nikaido cheerfully greets them from the counter. Tetsujou looks around the place, spotting a patron in a booth but seeing no sign of Kaiman. Dokuga pats his arm to catch his attention and tells him that he's going to sort things out with Nikaido. He stands there awkwardly, wondering if that means he’s supposed to stay away from their conversation, but a minute into it Nikaido gestures for him to come closer. He does as he’s told, and she offers him a hand to shake. 

“Tetsujou, right? Good to see you again,” she says, squeezing his hand quite firmly when he goes for the handshake. “Dokuga told me that he’s a bit dangerous around food.”

“Huh?” he asks. He looks at Dokuga, who is very pointedly looking away. “I mean, as long as he doesn’t spit on it…”

“Yeah, well, a risk is a risk, and I’d still like to have someone help me man the kitchen, you see.” She pats the counter and gestures at Dokuga. “Of course, a regular waiter is good too, but my shop has become quite popular lately, now that magic users barely come by. I can pay two henchmen.”

Tetsujou squints at her, more than a little confused. “Are you saying you want to hire me? But—”

“There’s no reason for you to continue working near the lake,” Dokuga interrupts. “Also, we work well together and we’ve got experience working in restaurants.”

“We-we do…” he admits. Something in his brain clicks and he nervously licks his lips. “Dokuga, did you recommend me to her?”

Dokuga looks away again. With that reaction, he proves Tetsujou right.

“He sure did,” Nikaido confirms anyway, which makes something in his chest squeeze. 

He’s so touched… Dokuga really paid attention to the fact that working near the place where he saw their friends die was extremely upsetting for Tetsujou, and he immediately did something to fix that. The fact that he would do something like that for him without a second thought is far too much for Tetsujou to handle.

"Thank you," he tells him quietly before turning his head to smile at Nikaido. "Sure, I'll take the job. I’ll quit my current one tomorrow.”

"Nice.” She smiles back. “The salary won't be anything fancy, just for the record."

Tetsujou shrugs. "As long as it keeps us fed. Things might be a little awkward with Kaiman though, considering who we are."

"Eh, he'll be fine," Nikaido says, waving a hand. "He's a simple guy, he’ll get over it eventually."

Tetsujou opens his mouth to reply, but he cuts himself short when he hears the door opening and sees a familiar, gigantic figure walking in. He's about to say an awkward greeting, but then his eyes hone in on the newcomer's head. 

"Hey, guys," Risu says, getting over his shock of seeing them remarkably fast. "You look like you're doing good." 

"Hi, why do you have horns," Dokuga replies at the same time as Tetsujou points at Risu's head and says, "Those are horns." 

"Ah, yeah, I'm training to become a devil," Risu says like that's not the craziest fucking thing. He turns around to show them a swirling black tail. "I have a tail too." 

"Oh my god," Tetsujou breathes as Dokuga says, "You look insane."

"Wait until I become an actual devil," Risu tells them, sitting on the stool next to Tetsujou. "Hi, Nikaido. Can I get the usual?" 

"Sure," she says, rolling up her sleeves and starting to move around her open kitchen. "Where's Asu?"

"He got mad at me for something stupid so I didn’t invite him to come," Risu replies, which makes her laugh. He turns to Tetsujou and Dokuga again. "So why are you guys here?"

"We're gonna work here," Dokuga explains. From the corner of his eye, Tetsujou sees him reaching for one of his knives. "You're not gonna try to kill us because of what we did in the past, are you?"

Risu chuckles and shakes his head. "Nah, don't worry, I've been having trouble holding grudges since Curse left my body. And I attacked you guys too, so let's call it even."

"That's reassuring," Tetsujou says, resting his elbows on the counter. "I don't exactly wanna make an enemy of a devil-to-be."

"Don't worry! After all that went down in there… well, I'm actually glad you guys are doing okay."

"Awfully nice of you,” Dokuga replies, resting his chin on his hand. “Is the conflict between us really resolved this easily?”

Risu arches an eyebrow, confusion clear in his features. “Do you not want it to?”

“No, I do.” Dokuga sighs and looks up at the ceiling. “Nothing’s going like I expected it to, I guess.”

He sends Tetsujou a meaningful look that he doesn’t know how to return. He wants to know what Dokuga is thinking when he says that but his expression confuses him. It’s not emotionless, but not happy or sad either. 

What are you feeling right now? he wants to ask. Share everything with me.

“Things rarely do,” Nikaido chimes in, putting a plate of gyozas and a mug of… something in front of Risu. “Anyway, get up and come join me, you guys. I’ll show you the ropes.”

The former Cross-Eyes share a short look before shrugging to each other and slipping off their respective stools. Whatever feelings a conversation with Risu might bring can easily be pushed aside because, if there is anything Dokuga and Tetsujou are good at, it’s working. Occupying themselves with whatever will earn them money has always been something natural for them both, so they don’t take too long before Nikaido gives them each an apron and starts making them do actual work. Risu came in early to avoid bumping into a mass of customers, so the day gets busier after he pays up and says his goodbyes. Dokuga waits tables and sweeps the floor while Tetsujou assists Nikaido in the kitchen and cleans up after her. Everything about the rest of the day is so terribly ordinary that, before Tetsujou can realize it, they’re closing up shop and giving their goodbyes to Nikaido. 

Days in Hole didn’t seem to go by this quickly before, and Tetsujou has to wonder if being with Dokuga makes time seem to move faster. It's so easy to be with him, to just coexist quietly. They’re going home together now and Tetsujou finds it so comforting, walking side by side at a leisurely pace. Tetsujou doesn’t remember the last time they were able to do that—as Cross-Eyes elites, they used to be so busy that they tended to run more than they tended to walk, and hurrying home became a habit after they settled in Hole, since going home to Dokuga provided a comfort that Tetsujou sorely needed. Without any of those reasons hurrying his steps, he can truly take his time and enjoy the walk back home. Hole isn’t particularly pretty to look at so his gaze strays to the side, following every movement coming from Dokuga’s side. It settles on his hand and, tentatively, he moves his own so their pinkies knock together. He’s ready to withdraw his hand as if nothing ever happened, but Dokuga grabs it before he can do that. 

They stop walking to look at each other and Dokuga says, “Is something up?”

“No, it’s just…” Tetsujou shakes his head, sheepish, and carefully intertwines their fingers. He lifts their joined hands up so Dokuga can get a good look at how they fit together. “Is this okay?”

“Oh,” Dokuga murmurs, blushing ever so slightly. He looks down and starts walking again, pulling Tetsujou forward with him. “Yeah. You can do whatever you want.”

“I’d rather ask first,” he replies, unable to keep a grin out of his face. He quite likes this view of Dokuga’s back, especially when he can feel his warmth through the hand he’s holding. 

“Gah… I never know how to react when you act like this...”

“Like what?” He asks, but Dokuga doesn’t reply. Tetsujou takes longer strides to catch up to him so they can walk side by side, and he sees one of those troubled expressions on his partner’s face. “Kindly?” he tries, and Dokuga purses his lips. “I won’t stop, you know? The others would get mad if I treated you in any way you don’t deserve.”

Dokuga stops walking again, scowling down at his feet, and Tetsujou wonders if they’ll ever get home at this pace. He tries to squeeze his hand reassuringly and Dokuga squeezes it back. Tetsujou finds himself smiling again. 

“I’d be the one they’d get mad at,” he says, running a thumb over Tetsujou’s knuckles. “For being blind to your feelings.”

“They wouldn’t,” Tetsujou whispers, but Dokuga shakes his hand. 

“No, they would. If I failed to give you the appreciation, the— the love you deserve, they would.” Dokuga takes a deep breath and looks up, his amber eyes focused, his gaze full of determination. “But I want to make them proud. I want to be someone they’d be proud to know.”

Tetsujou wants to tell him that he already is, that he always was, but he doesn’t want to put any brakes on Dokuga’s personal growth. He just gives him a tender smile and steps closer to hug him. Dokuga reciprocates immediately, wrapping his arms around his waist like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Tetsujou turns his head and kisses his hair, finding the smell of fried food that lingers in it strangely comforting. 

“Let’s make them proud together, then,” he says, affectionately nosing the junction between Dokuga’s neck and shoulder. 

“Yes,” Dokuga agrees, tightening their hug. “Together.”