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Sho appraised the gift in Labrys’ hands cautiously. “If this is food, I’m not accepting it,” he said flatly.
“I don’t think Minazuki-kun would let ya get that far,” she remarked sheepishly, not withdrawing her arms. “It’s not food. Promise.”
Hesitantly, Sho reached out and took the present from his girlfriend. It was a moderately-sized red box, and Sho gave it a precautionary shake. The sound was muted and there was no screaming, so there was luckily nothing alive in there. “What’s the occasion?” he asked instead, pulling at the loosely-tied bow. It was green, making it seem like a belated Christmas gift… despite it being May. He was awful at the whole being a socially-acclimated human being thing, but he was certain that this was far too late to be receiving a gift for the winter holidays-
Labrys offered a small shrug. “It’s been a year since we met,” she answered simply, her words gentle. “And well… I guess I wanted ta get ya somethin’ because of that.”
Oh, Minazuki commented, potentially just as surprised as Sho was. I hadn’t realized it had been a year since then.
“A year since we tried to destroy everything and kill you and all of your friends,” Sho said mildly, his chest tight for a reason unbeknownst to him. Was it always this difficult to breathe while talking about the past? He swallowed past the lump in his throat before rediscovering his voice. “Definitely something to celebrate, yeah?”
The girl shook her head, determination clear in her stern gaze. “Y’know that’s not what we’re celebratin’ here,” she chided. “This is ‘cause we met a year ago today.”
Sho’s lips twisted, his fingers tightening against the cardboard of the box. He nearly killed her and her friends. He was the one who threw her into the TV in the first place, she should hate him-
“I don’t think it’s much of a happy memory,” he said before forcing a crooked smile, feeling a strange mix of panic and confusion. His heart was beating uncomfortably fast, as if it was attempting to escape the cage of his ribs. “Unless you’re into that kind of stuff? Which would be kind of funny, y’know, ‘cause you’re, like-”
“Please stop doin’ that,” Labrys interrupted, her expression pinched. Sho’s voice caught in his throat, the rest of his words dying on his tongue. He had already forgotten what he was in the middle of saying as she continued, “Ya always go right back ta laughin’ and jokin’ like nothin’ is wrong…”
“... What am I supposed to do then?” he asked quietly, his shoulders trembling. He really should have been angry here, seething at the thought of being weak, but he just felt empty. Wrath had left him, leaving a sorry husk of sadness. Dad would have been disappointed, seeing his favorite weapon growing painfully pathetic-
Labrys reached forward, placing her hands onto his. “It’s okay ta just be sad,” she said gently, “or, well… anything. You don’t always gotta force yourself to be angry.”
Minazuki seemed to react to that first, considering the horror that Sho felt emerging from his Plume of Dusk. She…
Sho ducked his head, forcing his eyes to focus on his hands around the gift she had given him, her hands on his. Not being angry all the time was… scary. Dad liked it when he was angry; he was more powerful that way. The old bastard would smile at him, and even if it was fake, it was the closest thing to affection that Sho ever received until his time with the Shadow Operatives. Anger was comfortable. Familiar.
She is correct, Minazuki finished, a bit more soft-spoken than usual. Perhaps this is a necessary paradigm shift, going forward from here.
Sho squeezed his eyes shut, a weak chuckle escaping him. “I dunno what the hell that even means,” he murmured.
“What did Minazuki-kun say?” Labrys asked patiently. She had never been judgemental at all, even back when they first met. She had always been one of the few people to be quite unaffected by him supposedly talking to himself. It was just another one of his abnormalities that she accepted in stride.
He shook his head, cracking his eyes open. Her hands were still on his in a comforting gesture, alleviating some of the pressure that had built up in his chest. “Some big word that I don’t know the meaning of,” he answered dismissively, the hysteria that had been all-encompassing beginning to fade. A genuine smile crossed his face when he shook the box in his hands lightly. “Y’think I should finally open this?”
Labrys retracted her hands and laughed a little. “That’s kinda what ya do with gifts, Sho-kun,” she said teasingly, but not mean-spirited by any means. “I hope ya like it.”
Slowly, he began to undo the bow, the ribbon falling from the box and around the palm of his hand. It had been neatly tied, as if Labrys had spent a sizable amount of time on it. Once that was undone, he removed the lid and caught sight of what was inside.
“... Is that alive?” he asked cautiously, failing to tear his eyes from the fuzzy… whatever was in there. Why hadn’t he heard it making noise when he shook the box earlier? Was this creature even still alive? Did it die from a lack of oxygen because he took so long-
“Pick it up and you’ll find out,” Labrys said with a cryptic giggle, which was not a good sign.
She would not give you a dead animal, Minazuki commented, which reassured Sho at least a little bit. Perhaps it ate her cooking and died in there.
“Please shut the hell up,” Sho grumbled, reaching his hand into the box to take the hopefully-not-dead creature into his palm. To his absolute horror, it was cold and squished in his hand with hardly any resistance. She actually gave him a dead animal, what the fuck-
He dropped the box in surprise, leaving the creature in his hand in plain view. Its beady eyes were unmoving, its fur much too soft to be real… Sho blinked, appraising the animal in his hand again. Why were there lines all over it…?
“It’s a stuffed animal,” Labrys explained, perhaps spurred on by Sho’s shocked silence. “It’s a hedgehog.”
Sho brought it up to his face to examine it further. On a second look, it was very obviously fake. Its body was smooth and its fur was very soft to the touch. He could make out the lines of stitching around its body, and he gave the hedgehog another squeeze, watching as its body contorted under his fingers.
“... Why?” he asked eventually, his brain still refusing to process this gift.
Labrys offered a sheepish shrug. “It kinda reminded me of you,” she said.
He looked at the creature in his hand, challenging it to a staring contest. Unsurprisingly, it won, and Sho grumbled, “I’m not seeing the resemblance.”
“Well, uh,” she shifted her weight from foot to foot, perhaps nervous to explain her reasoning. “Hedgehogs have quills and are spiky to the touch. … But once you get to see them for who they really are, they’re not that prickly at all.”
Sho turned his face away from her and the stuffed animal in his palm. Was she mocking him?
Hesitantly, Labrys began, “If ya don’t like it-”
“I’ll accept it,” he interrupted, even if his face felt like it was on fire. “It’s not food and you put thought into it, so…”
Labrys laughed, causing Sho to trail off and forget the rest of his poor excuse. “I’m glad!” she chirped, bending down to grab the box he had dropped earlier. Once it was safely in her hands and she had stood upright, she said, “I should probably head back to Tatsumi Port. I think Mitsuru-san was gonna dispatch me for a mission.”
“Alright,” he said for a lack of anything else. The days of him cursing out Kirijo were in the past, and he knew how dedicated Labrys was to being a Shadow Operative. She had already spent time with him, and now it was back to work. It would be selfish to ask for anything more. “... Thanks for the gift, Scrap.”
She skirted forward to stand in front of him and extended the bottom stubs of her legs, giving her some extra leverage to plant a chaste kiss to his cheek. “I’m really glad we met,” she said.
Sho found a smile coming naturally to his lips. “Yeah… me too.”
Labrys leaned back, offering him a smile of her own. “You really are like a hedgehog,” she giggled, her gaze soft.
“... You’re lucky I love you,” he grumbled in response.
After bidding each other farewell, Sho watched as Labrys walked off. She had offered him a small wave before igniting the propellers of her axe and taking flight; he looked at her shrinking silhouette with a small sense of awe.
She is quite remarkable, is she not? Minazuki asked once the moment had settled and the last sight of Labrys had faded past the horizon. Slightly cheeky, yes, but she has an admirable heart.
Sho's eyes trailed from the sky to the hedgehog in his hand, his gaze softening at the sight of it. "Yeah," he breathed, wearing a genuine smile. "She really is."