Archive of Our Own

1

With all its backstreets and unclimbable shadows, the magic world is wonderful. It stands larger, brighter than life, and he fits just the way it was always meant to be. There couldn't be a better reason to look nowhere but ahead .

Smoke flows out his fingertips, labored, few, and he’s got no problem at all hanging out forever in the outskirts. No one else needs to understand it, nor how it is to feel comfortably small under a devil’s distant shadow. No one needs to be there at all, when he hikes out to the middle of nowhere, stares breathless at the run-down city below.

… Though it got old eventually. Eating, playing around by himself. But he’s never needed more than a couple friendly faces who’ll laugh with him, call his name in the school corridors, and shake amused heads when he suggests they pay him back every little thing by taking him out for lunch many more times than they’ll agree to it.

That’s fine by him. Knowing little more than his classmates’ names and masks, offering no more in return. It’s a fun and simple way of living.

Friends are too much work. He’s got more than enough with his own personal shit. Old acquaintances have asked one too many questions once or twice, but it’s always easy to deflect, drive the topic back to trivial chatter, a lot easier than it would be to lie (he does his best to stay in that same footing, close enough to borrow a few nick once in a while but not much more- he’ll listen if they insist, but if he were to start making friends … maybe holding his tongue would take biting it down).

Living that way is almost natural in a world like this. One way or another, it must be the same for everyone else around him, forever watching their own backs ( friends are to be counted with the fingers of one hand; it isn’t such a big deal that he keeps his in a fist).

If he gets called in to help with homework, or go for drinks on the occasion, then he can’t ask for more.

(Stepping out into this world, himself for the first time, the clear path he traced all those years back turned up blurry at the edges, walkable still - whatever that means.)

He’s had plenty of time to go over his options, few as they are, and make the most of them. Breathing clearer than ever, growing less aware of the new weight inside his head (new, but not foreign), along his blood veins, by the day, no mundane sacrifice can be too much. So, it’s always been easy, keeping everyone at arm’s length. Years of it stuffed up his sleeve in preparation. For that one-way switch to turn like lightning strike, for a door to lock one step behind. Changing the reason didn’t take much more work.

Well, it didn’t used to .

As far as things go, Risu is still a new face around school. Aikawa remembers hearing his name, pausing for a second when people around him gossiped about the cross marks on his eyes, but not looking up. That was the end of it back then. He can’t even remember if they crossed paths again that first week, or if he showed up to class at all. It was just a new guy, if Aikawa was to learn his name and face like he’s done most of his other classmates, then it would happen on its own.

And it did. Not with Risu joining in conversations or even laughing at his jokes like other people did, but in something much more accidental.

… Hell, Aikawa’s been avoiding any crosseye that happens to step inside the school. He’s got nothing against them personally! It’s just the way they talk about their boss what makes him sick. Nothing will make them change their mind; they’re better off keeping their distance.

But he’s not the kind of asshole who’ll reject them if they talk to him just ‘cause they’re crosseyes. Marks or no marks, everyone at school is on the same boat.

Most long-term acquaintances have become such by chance. If he looks back at them, at anyone who knows his name on the hallways, he can first trace them back to being at the wrong place, at the wrong time, and maybe to having a little too much fun giving bullies a real opponent.

Helping people often means looking for trouble. If he ever stopped to ask, he’s sure people would tell him to look the other way and keep walking- good advice, really. But where’s the harm in making sure his fighting skills aren’t rusty, having fun and doing a little good in the process? Especially if it gets him free lunch three out of ten times (gets him people who’ll look for seats close to his, ask anatomy questions he doesn’t have to check to answer. Even if that’s all they can ask).

He wasn’t waiting in the vents for Risu to show up, not specifically. Something was up with that teacher and anyone he called into his office to scam would’ve done the trick. It was a pleasant surprise to see that Risu stood up against him, but even then Aikawa didn’t expect him to stay till the end, least of all help him get rid of that asshole for good.

… He should’ve seen himself out shortly after the truck left, though. It was the practical thing to do. Given that Risu wasn’t just a crosseye by name, looking for nothing but his own gain.

“Y’know,” he said instead, filling in after their introductions. “People usually buy me lunch for helping them.”

Maybe he thought it wouldn’t matter, that it’d be fine if he was just another friendly face to talk to on the occasion. He can’t remember. What he does remember: Risu’s friendly smile dropping in favor of a narrow glare and a do you always say that?

Soon enough, though, he sighed. “Fine.” In the split second before he turned away completely, Aikawa caught the rise of a sly smile. “You comin’ or what?”

Talking about the true merit of South Zagan, and maybe magic schools as a whole, Risu led him to a noodle shop a few blocks down.

Somewhere between the first crossing and the bell ringing their arrival, their conversation had turned into a long-winded complaint about each of their teachers (halfway through his second bowl, Aikawa joked about taking them out one by one so maybe they’d send better ones, that they wouldn’t stand a chance against the both of them. Risu drowned his open amusement in a soda can).

When that got stale, Aikawa asked about his first week around, talked about his close to ten months in return. Paid silent but close attention to the pricing of Risu’s order on the menu behind the counter.

Their conversation didn’t dull out, not even when the check finally arrived, coming out four times as much as Aikawa’s usual. Maybe Risu had more money than he let on, he thought, that’s not unheard of between crosseyes.

“Aw, crap,” he said, then, patting his pockets with stiff hands. “Think I forgot my wallet.” Anyone can lie behind a full-face mask. All it takes is giving a convincing stare, whatever the situation calls for. Risu, though? “… Sorry, man.”

If Aikawa didn’t know what to look for, he might have caught him off-guard.

“Nah, no worries.”

Anyone can lie behind a mask; Risu wears none. Aikawa would’ve almost liked to fall for his scam. It takes true talent. That, he could appreciate. Could certainly pay out of his own pocket and act like it was some kind of reward. There wasn’t anything for Aikawa in that but, whatever, it’s not like he makes any of his money.

Out the door, just a moment after they’d said their goodbyes for the evening, Aikawa figured there was something he could get out of it, after all.

Before Risu started to walk away, it was Aikawa’s turn to let a grin slip. Not that anyone else could tell. Quick hands are a useful skill to have, but Aikawa’s always been more of a physical guy, barreling head on and ready to strike. Plus, he wasn’t really going to take Risu’s wallet. No matter how obvious it sat in his pocket when he moved.

Still, he wasn’t mad when he felt the cold tip of a stake below his jaw. It was that same skill; his way of pulling them seemingly out of nowhere and with no movement at all just what he had praised a couple hours beforehand.

“Wow, you’re ruthless ,” he chuckled, pushing the wallet back down. “Thought you hadn’t brought any money, though?”

That was enough to make Risu pull the stake away. “Alright asshole, you caught me,” he groaned. “I’d be dead if I paid for everything I’m supposed to.”

“True, true.”

Aikawa left it with his best attempt at a backhanded compliment, his most sincere see you tomorrow , and decided Risu had to be the coolest person in his class. That he could even overlook the praising to the crosseyes’ boss that would surely come with hanging around him longer than necessary.

The next day, Risu greeted him with a raised hand, reluctantly moved when Aikawa went to take the seat next to him, and side-eyed him as soon as he asked if he was at least up to paying his half of the bill with the wallet he had surely brought that day.

“Are you fucking serious?” he asked through gritted teeth.

“Or…” Aikawa said, stretching it out enough to grab his attention. “We could just dine and dash next time. That sounds pretty economic.”

“Next time, huh?”

Easily angered as Risu is, it was never too difficult to get a smile out of him.

One too many times jogging to catch up to him after school, but just one time standing side by side on the rooftop, leaning on the rusty railing. Higher than all other buildings around; high enough to stare out and try to map out the nearest cities. That’s all it took for Aikawa to notice.

That the only routine he held before was walking to the cafeteria and running out of it seconds later, hands full. That his classmates were usually the ones taking up the seats around him. That he had never been to the rooftop for so long before (empty, silent… maybe not so at all).

As little as promising to bring cake on October nineteenth no matter what, asking about cacti flowers, betting a losing bet just so Risu would think he wasn’t about to lend him the few hundred nick he needed for that month’s rent; all things he’s never done- he’d never do for any of his other acquaintances.

Maybe not so little, then…

The more he thinks about it, the less Risu fits in with everyone else he helps out with homework, steals lunch from on the occasion… the more obvious it is he can’t keep acting like he still does.

Friends are to be counted with the fingers of one hand, right? Having zealously kept all of his from getting cut off so far doesn’t mean they’re all meant to stay down.

(Years of staying back and looking and waiting for his moment to arrive. Nothing can erase that feeling. Nothing can compare to the accidental joy that comes with the smallest glimpse of what it’s like to be called a friend by someone who means it…)

Friends are complicated. They take time and effort Aikawa can’t be bothered to invest… but if it’s just Risu…

And if he makes sure things stay just the way they are, maybe if he pulls away enough, while he has time, why the hell should he worry about it?

2

Painful as they are, headaches were never more than an inconvenience. An all-stopping, head-splitting, debilitating inconvenience. He never used to get many of them as… as a kid, but in the grand scheme of things, is nothing he can’t live with.

They come in without warning, ransack his thoughts with someone else’s, no room for all of them. Deafening, vertigo-inducing. Growing all over at once, threatening to tear off his skin, spit out his eyes. Nails on a chalkboard and toxic rain and the deep, soothing bubbling of rising magma.

Over. The skin of his neck thins out, severs vessels and vertebrae with the agonizing dripping of his own blood and it’s over. Delaying it has only ever made it worse.

They come with no warning but they never last long if he listens. Sometimes he only gets one day to himself in between them, and sometimes he goes for weeks without one. There’s no way to tell but he’s never felt the need to. It’s a fair price to pay for the life he always wanted, the one he’s meant to live. Plus, he’s free to do whatever he pleases with his own time and doesn’t need to worry about housing or money! It’s worth having to pay to retake important tests or missing out on some fun and having it told second-hand later any day.

On the off-chance someone was there with him when a headache broke right through his skull, they never did more than give an odd look and wave goodbye, didn’t ask about it afterwards. People in this world are used to not prying. As disappointing as it is not getting to hear any crazy rumors about why sometimes it’s like he’s vanished completely.

Risu, too, didn’t do more than glare the first couple times (always mid-conversation, like it is sending a message of some sort- it probably isn’t. Aikawa knows better than to treat its cravings as something other than blind instinct. Whatever it is it seeks). But they’re always together these days. Motorcycle trips to nowhere to celebrate Aikawa getting his license until the thing got months old and they couldn’t keep calling them that, dinner, sight-seeing and even drinking with some of their classmates… he can’t attend them all. No matter how much he wants to.

Canceling last minute is fine. It mostly means holding his head in place, mumbling out an apology and running away before anything else can be said. It’s a bummer, it leaves Risu rolling his eyes at him for the first few minutes of their next conversation, but rescheduling or bribing his forgiveness generally does the trick.

But letting him down ? Getting struck the night before or halfway out his door, no way to tell him he won’t make it. It’s not for lack of trying that he can’t even cancel properly. Half awake, ears full of dark liquid, he can only think about Risu. Waiting not so patiently for him to show up. Like underwater, he keeps wondering, over and over, when it is he finally gives up on it and goes about his following days.

When he came to, days later, the first time it happened… Looking back on it, he’s not sure how he managed to look Risu in the eyes again… or how in the world Risu found it in him to forgive him (every word spoken a different, worse kind of livid , a carved frown that finally put into perspective why someone so young had such terrible wrinkles- Aikawa hadn’t need any of it to feel the pressure crushing his lungs).

“Is it a work thing?” Risu asked him days later. “When you disappear for days.”

It wasn’t the first time someone asked about it. Takeo meant it more as a joke, and even if he hadn’t, Aikawa never so much as considered giving out an answer of any kind. He laughed it off with a does it matter? and that was the end of it. But Risu is his friend .

He wasn’t supposed to let anyone get close enough to ask and get a real answer. That is exactly why it was always too much trouble, too complicated. But Risu pops the question and if anyone deserves any kind of answer, the most he can give, then it’s him.

“Uh, something like that, I guess.”

“Then why don’t you just say so instead of faking a headache?”

Giving up that answer didn’t solve much, though. Aikawa didn’t expect not to get that same, rabid reaction next time it happened- but in the same way, he didn’t expect forgiveness again. He wanted it, of course he did; of course he still does, every time something happens. Because Risu is his friend, and Aikawa has never enjoyed someone’s company this much. But he’s not so optimistic he can’t see how they’re headed for disaster.

Risu is volatile. One day he’ll get fed up with half truths and disappointments. He’ll walk away, oozing resentment and, knowing him, he’ll probably take it to the grave.

Being aware of it so early should make things easier. Should make accepting it easier, at least.

His first ever friendship was doomed from the start. So, be it years, months or days, he can’t start mourning what he hasn’t yet lost!

Last time he saw Risu was around three days ago. They parted ways after going for lunch with no other plans, and Aikawa was hit with a headache a couple hours later. For all it’s worth, they should be on good terms.

He’s never gone out of his way to meet anyone else on the weekend if they didn’t have plans beforehand. But he wants to see Risu. Has known where he lives for almost two weeks now yet hasn’t done anything about it? Changing that’s long overdue.

No one replies when he knocks on the apartment door. But Aikawa came here decided to hang out with his friend, and he can’t take too long to come back, whatever it is he’s doing. He sits down by the doorstep and waits.

The floor is damp and uneven, and while it’s true it was Risu himself who walked him here that first time, a convenience store bag full of beer in one hand, snacks in the other, he never told him he could show up whenever he wanted. Which makes it all the more fun.

There was only ever one other place with its doors always open to him (it smelled of antiseptic and iron, of iodine and rot. A rough, worn voice welcomed him warm every time, looked amused over his shoulder every now and then with understanding no one else had ever matched- Aikawa’s almost confused over why he can’t remember who it belonged to). That place, wherever it was, was nothing like the small, messy apartment behind the door. But he can’t shake the feeling that, if he stands inside for long enough, then it will feel just as welcoming, in a completely different way.

Of course it’s not entirely up to him. But Risu isn’t stupid; he must have known showing him the way to his apartment meant Aikawa would show up at his door next time he was bored. If Risu doesn’t like it, then he’ll just have to keep coming until he gets used to it.

Heavy footsteps drag themselves closer, then, echoing up the stairs only a few minutes after Aikawa has finally found a comfortable sitting place. They reach him almost instantly, just enough time for him to put a friendly hand out for when Risu finally gives him a questioning look.

“What’re you doing here?” he asks, searching his pocket.

Aikawa rises to his feet, moves out of the way on unsteady footing. “Thought I’d drop by, see what you’re up to.”

Though there’s not much of a reaction, Risu still goes to unlock the door, leaves it wide open behind him. As good an invitation as any.

He makes his way in carefully, standing a good few meters from where Risu has placed the bags on the kitchen counter. Hands in his hoodie’s pockets, eyes wandering anywhere but left (he skipped no plans; nothing should be wrong. Risu is oddly quiet and he’s not about to make it worse).

“Nothing interesting, I was just out for groceries,” Risu sighs in the end, taking cans and packets out by the handful.

Overstaying has hardly ever helped. But if Aikawa has learned something, it’s that keeping quiet while doing so is often worse .

“I’m staying for dinner, then,” he only means half of it. If Risu wants him to, he’ll be out the door in no time, will wait until he’s the one approaching on his own, even if he never does (still, he takes off his mask and says it with a big smile).

When he opens his eyes to peek, Risu has stopped glaring daggers at the unsuspecting pack of instant noodles.

“Fine,” he says, his face the smallest bit relaxed. “But you better pay back everything you eat.”

Aikawa doesn’t know every room in the house, doesn’t know where Risu keeps his good mugs, or which of the stove’s burner is the defective one he mentioned in passing. Not being able to tell if the air is truly any different than it was last time he was here is only natural (there’s no reason for it to be, not this time. But he can’t pretend Risu doesn’t house enough animosity to fill him five times over. Or deny his ever-growing contribution to it).

“Oh, right,” Risu starts, looking at him at last. “I got one of those cables for watching devil channels a couple days ago.”

(But, maybe for today, it’s still not close to bursting.)

“Aren’t those crazy expensive? No wonder you’re making me pay you back some cheap noodles.”

“That’s ‘cos you’ll end up eating them all!” at least the look he gives him is more annoyed than it is angry - gone the same way it arrived. Exchanged for a smirk. “Of course I stole it.”

“What? Without me?”

“I’ve never seen you be quiet in my life; you’d just get in the way.”

“How cruel!” he pouts, dramatically crossing his arms. “You’ve never seen me get caught, either!”

In that moment, it’s like they haven’t fought in months. Like Risu’s never had to ask where he was when they were supposed to be together. Like Aikawa’s time is all his own to use and he’s never given Risu a single reason to lose his temper.

Then he opens his eyes again, and Risu isn’t facing him anymore.

“... And I didn’t plan it,” he says, a can hitting the cupboard like thunder. “The chance showed up and you just weren’t there.”

Because the truth is that Aikawa can count with the fingers of both hands the amount of times things have been nothing but fine . That being let down is one of many things he’s forced Risu to put up with since the very start of their friendship, and that his time, himself are something else’s leftovers, and he can’t possibly fight it. Not when it’s all he has (not when it is the sole reason he can live. Truly ).

Countless apologies sit at the tip of his tongue. All of them honest, all of them pointless . He keeps them all right there, drowned in blood the same way as his teeth, for the next time he has no choice but to give up one of them for the same reason he’s done before. Knowing well he’ll need it again (knowing even better that one day not even honesty will be enough).

Neither of them talk while Risu stacks cans in cupboards, produce in the fridge. Air grows in the density of mud, and Aikawa isn’t sure where to go.

“You came here to stand there? Grab some snacks and pick a channel while I finish.”

Aikawa does as he’s told. Sits down on the couch but only holds his finger over the power button on the remote.

Secrets are a given in this world. Most people keep their real faces hidden behind a mask, don’t expose their magic to those they cannot kill, and watch their own backs better than anyone else’s. Earning someone’s trust takes more than loyalty and dedication, and even then , there are things better kept locked up.

Everyone, without exception, keeps secrets they cannot say. He shouldn’t feel guilty that it’s the same for him too.

Plus, there’s surely plenty of things Risu hasn’t told him, things he’ll never say. That’s how it makes sense for things to work. Risu will never know what he does when he’s away, nor why he can’t know it; Aikawa will never know what Risu hides. An unspoken deal.

(An unspoken deal Risu does nothing to uphold. And if that’s entirely his fault, for giving more than he’s given, why does Aikawa hate that it has to be this way?)

3

Any intention to steer clear away from crosseyes’ business died out months ago. Of course he still looks away from dark alleys and quickens his pace around marked trucks, but Risu is a crosseye. In all the ways it makes him naive- stupid . Aikawa can’t pretend he doesn’t know what he does for a living (worse than those who do it for the black powder or the easy money, Risu does it for an ideal . He sees hope in a shapeless figure, and someone’s gotta knock some sense into him).

Risu is a crosseye. Aikawa wants to hit him hard over the head every time he dives head first into the shadiest of jobs, and if he’s too stubborn to let him, then he just has to make sure things turn out as fine as possible.

That’s how it started. An unwanted warning, an eye roll- an scorching heat at the back of his lungs and a half-assed excuse about not having anything else to do. Risu fought it, said they wouldn’t entrust shit to him if he brought along an outsider, that it didn’t make sense for him to be around in the first place and that it was none of his business, but he didn’t seriously think any of that would stop Aikawa, right?

It turned out way more boring than he expected, all black powder delivery and body shipping. After a while Risu told him that if he was just hoping he’d throw him a bone, he better start looking elsewhere.

“You think I’d be helping out the crosseyes for easy money?”

“Then why do you insist on coming?”

“‘Cause I want to help you out, asshole,” one elbow to the ribs later, Risu smiled.

Things went a lot smoother after that. Risu started waiting for him, spilling details he likely wasn’t supposed to (always unnervingly close to déjà vu. More than enough for Aikawa to lock himself away from it, change the subject. But… somewhere deep inside, something keeps quietly filling in the blanks), and going with him finally became a part of their routine in the same way spending their breaks on the rooftop by themselves was long before.

So, one day a couple months down the line, it happened. Some crazy asshole’s magic turned out to be stronger than they had been warned and he put up a tough fight for a two on one. There was a lot of sweat and blood and there’s only so much effort he can excuse as healthy exercise, but…

“Phew, thought he was immortal or some shit,” Risu said, wiping off his forehead and smearing red instead. “Great work, partner.”

Suddenly Aikawa’s knuckles didn’t hurt anymore.

Up to that point, having a partner had felt too much like a daydream. The kind of wishful thinking someone in his position shouldn’t try to afford (humans- and other sorcerers might not value the concept of partnership, might not even understand the true importance of a word and promise remade every four years. But wanting a part of someone else inside might be the greatest sign of trust. Here, people don’t take that term lightly). Still, he couldn’t get himself to give up on it, no matter what.

It was worth it in the end. Holding out selfish hope- no. When he calls Risu his partner for any and all reason; for no reason at all, he really means all of it.

“I used to think having a partner only made sense for strong people, y’know,” Risu told him once as they stood up to head back to class. “... And I had been calling you that for a while so Tanabe-san would let you come with me on jobs. I had to say it to your face at some point.”

They’ve been partners for a while- well, as true that can be with just a verbal promise between them. So, when Risu points through a mouthful of rice, to the first blue beetle Aikawa has ever seen, neither of them can help talking about making it official.

Aikawa doesn’t hide one bit of his excitement. Jokes about perfecting the vile advantages of having a piece of him with direct influence on Risu, about how the odds are on his side because he can actually produce a bit of smoke, so clearly he’s the strongest magic user between them. Risu shuts him up with a pointy elbow to the gut… and he finds in the split second he stops laughing that he can’t do it anymore.

“We gotta sneak in, I’m not paying En for shit,” Risu says, the fierce shine in his eyes the only thing clear in Aikawa’s. “It’ll be great, though, people with no magic like us don’t get fought over, we get to have all the fun.”

His chest should be heavier in the same way his head and arms are. If there’s smoke flowing inside his veins, if he is a magic user, then surely…

He has the same weak points as anyone else, stands in place in this world the same as anyone else, the place carved for him, doesn’t matter by who. If a devil opened him up, reached behind his lungs, he’s got no reason to believe they wouldn’t find a contract. It’s not about his body- not in the way it should be. Because he’s got everything any other sorcerer has… but a foreign weight constricts at the base of his throat, rises like dark bubbles and he can’t ever forget the real reason he’s here at all.

Being partners is more than an oath to have each other’s backs. It’s a connection, a two-way energy flow. It’s, if Risu puts his all into it, a way to know where he is when he disappears. The world spins motionless, spiders grow beneath the skin on his neck and a thousand blades position themselves ready to strike his head side to side to side.

Edge soft against skin, just enough to dent. They don’t.

“Aikawa,” Risu calls, then, his brow knitted close.“… You don’t look happy about this.”

Partners don’t keep important secrets, partners don’t vanish without a trace and with no way to stop it, partners don’t live on something else’s downtime and no matter what Aikawa does, how much he wants to, he’s in no place to be anyone’s partner.

It doesn’t, could never keep him from wishing to get away with this one thing (with this one, crucial thing), but you don’t look happy about this and he would give anything for a way to explain why .

From the start, he knew this would happen if he got too close to someone. Knows he should’ve done anything in his power to save himself the hassle, the blame. Save Risu the letdown. And still he walked this far into a dead end, thinking good memories would somehow survive the fire.

But he can’t just walk away from here now, from Risu . He can’t make up lies and leave like he won’t look back every single day (but he can’t ever tell the truth and he can’t make promises because it’s never been Aikawa who has the final word).

“What’re you on about? ‘Course I am,” he says, bleeding tongue, collapsed lungs. “Would I call you my partner if I didn’t want to make it official?” then, leaning in for good measure, his mask still set aside by the empty sandwich wrappers: “But for the record, we are partners already. Nothing’s gonna change that, come on.”

So he promises Risu, promises himself , that they’ll meet on Blue Night. They’ll sign each other’s contracts and eat and drink and have fun and Aikawa knows better than to make that kind of promise.

But what was he supposed to do? Tell Risu that he doesn’t know if he’ll show up? Act like there’s anyone or anything else he values above him, that ditching their official partnership is an option he would consider , if it was up to him ?

Then again, maybe he should’ve told the truth. As much of it as he could manage, at least. Or maybe he should’ve just came up with an excuse on the spot instead of giving out false hope- because it’s not only him who wants to believe in it. Despite everything.

Hell, why does everything have to be so complicated ?

On a ticking clock days later, he stands with one hand on the doorknob and all of his muscles refuse to move. Always the way he wants them to, never the way it demands. The pressure inside his head turns on command, without warning, and wastes no time to squeeze his little devil beyond agony. Hammer to bone down to the marrow in every fragment, an underwater scream and countless needles going in and out his ears. No delay, no pattern, collecting side by side and burrowing . Air flows the wrong way down his windpipe and he wants to say he expected something- anything else.

But the only person he can’t lie to is himself. Not forever.

(Aikawa can’t remember the last time his hand wavered around a blade, or if his stomach has ever turned at the sight of spilled guts or maimed corpses. He’s never thought twice at the feel of the knife in his pocket. But-

… But it’s different when it’s not his own hand that holds it. When he can only sit and watch through eyes that don’t feel his at all. Gunmetal and words equally distant, muffled by the endless bubbling burying itself deep within his head, cocooning his brain. There’s not a single part of him it can’t reach).

By the time the world regains its sound, he’s still got a couple hours to make it (it’s hard to think with dark weight pulling down every limb, forcing down the chest… even then he dared to hope it would need all three days. That if he can’t be Risu’s partner because of it then it would at least take all the blame. Why would it end well now, if it never has before?).

The bathroom sink creaks when Aikawa leans on it, a muddy reflection stares back at him and he doesn’t know what he’s looking for.

It’s his own face, his own eyes he’s looking into. He wipes sweat off his forehead with hands that listen to him, his chest rises and falls erratic because he’s the one who’s let his own lungs hold his heart’s weight, and…

“ I hate you. ”

And when he speaks, it’s with his own voice, too.

All this time, he’s managed to keep looking Risu in the eye, he’s talked to him like it’s nothing and has somehow found a way to avoid it falling on top of him, breaking into smaller pieces than he can put back together. Pushing through, holding out with all his strength even though none of this depends on him alone, scrambling to fit in shards and fill the gaps. Risu has forgiven him. Never entirely, but he has . Has held out right by his side even though Aikawa doesn’t know if he’ll be allowed enough time to put things back together.

Risu has done so much for him. Much more than he would for anyone else, he knows. And this is how he pays him back? With lies disguised as promises, turning inside out to dig themselves into his hands?

Quiet lies are what brought everything he has. It always made sense that loud ones would take it all away.

From the very beginning, he knew . That things would end because of him, and that they would end messy and hopeless. He pushed through, told himself he’d simply enjoy it till the bitter end- and things can’t end like this ( still… ).

Risu is the first friend he’s ever had, maybe the only one he’ll ever have and no matter how selfish it is, he wants him to forgive him even now. Aikawa doesn’t deserve it, not when he’s failed him so many times, least of all because he will fail him again, but he didn’t deserve it the first, second, tenth time, either.

(A short while ago, Risu stood alarmingly close to him, unclasped his mask just to hold it in place, and Aikawa swallowed so hard Risu ended up dropping it in favor of laughing his ass off at him. That asshole.

Now he fucked up massively … and he least he can do is take anything thrown his way and apologize one last time. For everything.)

… Breathless, defeated, Aikawa sleeps away the last few hours of Blue Night- tries to.

At school, people talk about the festival so loudly that Aikawa wonders if he always pays this much attention to every conversation he walks by in the halls. He doesn’t even know half the idiots playfully arguing over which ride was the best or introducing someone else as their official partner, nothing they say concerns him in the slightest. It shouldn’t .

He sits at the desk early for the first time in ages and nothing anyone says or does gets him to look away from the door. In front of him, Takeo turns to ask how Blue Night went for him. Aikawa dodges the question with a lot less tact than usual.

Finally, after endless minutes of burning a hole in the wall opposite to the open door, Risu arrives.

… Maybe Aikawa should've thought through what he’d do when their eyes met.

Because Risu finds him immediately. Takes less than a second for his frown to carve angular in all the usual places. Tighter, deeper than Aikawa has ever seen. Closing shaking fists around his books, Risu walks all the way to the back of the room.

“Did you guys have a fight?” Takeo asks, glancing behind.

Aikawa doesn’t reply.

Even he’s tired of apologies and excuses. Tired of giving them out knowing it doesn’t make any difference. He can’t imagine how sick of them Risu must be. But there’s simply no way for him to explain or justify or stop . To make things right once and for all.

Walking away now might be the best thing he can do. Both for himself and for Risu. It’ll save them more guilt and disappointment (it wouldn’t have hurt at all if Aikawa stopped this all the moment it began. What made Risu so different from everyone else he has no trouble keeping in simpler places?). He should walk away now, look back only when no one else is; hope Risu, resentful as he is, doesn’t have that problem at all.

But when it comes to Risu… the simplest option turns out to be the hardest.

“Hey, uh,” he tries, a hand reaching for the back of his neck.

Only now is the rooftop buried in the kind of bleak silence Aikawa used to picture long before meeting Risu.

The empty streets below blare louder than the wind for a second more, then-

“So you’ll stroll around and come talk to me like nothing happened?” Risu growls , holding onto the railing hard enough to bend the rusty metal. “I waited for you. Three fucking days.”

“And I’m sorry I couldn’t make it! Something came up last minute, I-” nothing he says will fix this. Not if he can’t ever tell the whole truth. “… I didn’t want to miss it, I swear.”

The railing shrieks its loudest when Risu lets it go. “So you’re just gonna say ‘something’ came up but you can’t even be honest about what ?” he takes one step forward, furious eyes digging clean holes in Aikawa’s skin. “You knew how important this was to me!”

“It was important to me too!” having Risu think of him as his partner pulled his ribs the smallest bit open, away from everything they had sunk into- but that only made it all bleed. “I’d… I’d tell you what happened if I could, but I swear I would’ve done anything to be there!”

“Then why didn’t you?”

… Because it’s not up to me. He had the chance to but it’s not, and it sucks that it has to be this way and that he has to keep lying and hiding things and taking the blame for shit he wouldn’t ever do if he could help it. It sucks that Risu has to get hurt because of it, because of him . But there’s no way for Aikawa to explain.

“Risu…! Can we just-?”

Before he can finish, Risu bangs the door closed. Hard enough for screws and hinges to ring all throughout the rooftop. Echoing ages after he’s gone the same way Aikawa’s hands keep trying to reach for a shoulder long gone.

And this place could get lonelier, after all.

He could catch up to him if he tried, could draw this out only to make it worse, to sever this already. But why would he do that?

Risu is right for being mad at him. Risu is right if then why didn’t you is the last thing he ever says to him. It’ll echo all through Aikawa’s mind, claw its place in every dark corner, and he deserves all of it. Why would he reach out for Risu, if he dared to make a promise he knew he couldn’t keep? When he left him waiting for him, on Blue Night of all fucking times?

What kind of forgiveness can he possibly ask for?

Then why didn’t you follows his every step for the next week. Only alone in his apartment can he put together explanations that don’t explain anything at all. Scream them all to himself in a blurry mirror, bite them out like empty threats. And why didn’t he? What is it that Risu thinks he’d choose over him?

… Is it even worth it trying to fix things at this point?

It’s one day after class that Aikawa gets an answer.

“Aikawa!” Risu calls enthusiastically behind him and it stops him dead in his tracks. They haven’t talked in days, they haven’t looked in each other’s direction in days… so why is Risu calling his name like everything is fine? “Let’s go grab something to eat.”

When Aikawa finally turns around, Risu is waiting for him just a few steps back. Expectant and smiling and not mad at all.

Risu is great at playing dumb to his advantage… Aikawa wonders if he’d dare to kill him (wonders if he’d find it in him to resist ). But it’s not that empty, loud smile or that cutthroat ring at the end of every word and, if anything, Aikawa wants to say he knows him. That his easygoing front fools everyone but him- that Risu wouldn’t plot a stab in the back. Not against him .

That if he wanted him dead, he’d do it head on.

So then…? Aikawa thinks of asking what changed, what made him come back when he had thought their friendship worse than over. Risu walks up to his side, slaps his shoulder lightly and maybe it’s better if he doesn’t.

Aikawa’s used to pretending, right? That important things don’t matter, that he’s fine living half a life, that he doesn’t live half a life in the first place. That Risu is the one making a big deal out of his unpredictable disappearances.

Whatever it is Risu made up his mind about, if it means that, despite everything, he sticks around a little longer… Aikawa doesn’t need to hear it from him.

(But if Aikawa’s used to pretending, why does Risu acting like he didn’t ditch what should’ve been their most important night feel like ribs closing deeper, vicious into his lungs, slicing every artery clean through?)

4

Things between them have a way to bounce back.

Aikawa has no way to repair what he’s fucked up, which means he spends most of the time trying to compensate for it.

It’s forgetting to pay Risu back but picking up their tab nine out of ten times. It’s calling him solely by name and keeping his hands to himself until Risu grabs his shoulder and calls him friend, partner again all on his own (it’s picking up where they left it what feels like ages ago but taking the time to taste every dash of bitter that settles in his tongue when it’s him who does it). It’s stepping back when needed but, above all else, it’s being there for Risu, as much as he’s able .

Nothing Aikawa says gets Risu away from the crosseyes. Really, he’s tried . He takes on so many sketchy jobs, meets with so many sketchy people, that Aikawa can’t help calling him an idiot once in a while.

The crosseyes boss is a bluff. He’s not looking to bring strong magic users to their level, and if he wants to climb to the top, then he plans to do it alone. He’s not even trying to give hopeless people like them something to fight for. Anyone outside the organization can see that.

Still, Risu is a crosseye. And, on word alone, he allowed Aikawa to be his partner; no matter how much he hates the organization, how much he doubts every marked face he meets, he’ll help him.

That’s what partners are for.

(Bouncing back for them means knowing how to keep the peace. Aikawa doesn’t try to rip away Risu’s belief in the boss anymore- not as harshly. He doesn’t get in the way of business if the situation doesn’t call for it. In exchange, Risu has stopped asking where he’s gone, greets him as usual no matter for how long he disappears, no matter how bad the rumble at the very end of his throat betrays him.

It’s the most they can do.

… It’s the most Aikawa can do. Because if he could ever stop this , Risu would let all of his fuckups go one day. Because he never forgives and one heated argument is usually enough for him to despise someone’s guts, and yet he keeps Aikawa, of all people, closer than anyone else. Calls him his best friend, his partner… puts his arm over the backrest every time they watch TV, let him bring a fucking air mattress to keep ready under his bed… hell, they’ve even kissed . More times than it serves a purpose to count. So much for not making things worse for when everything goes to shit.)

Three more absences to his name (if anyone bothered to count those), Aikawa walks into the school.

He’s grown to accept that his magic won’t get any better. The best anyone here can hope for is some kind of accident that opens up their veins or getting their hands on a sufficient supply of black powder that’ll get them to the bare minimum level to have a glimpse of decent life. Aikawa isn’t too troubled over producing so little smoke he doesn’t know what his magic even is, and trying to find a reason for that is simply not worth it in his book. It is how it is. But he has money he doesn’t care to waste and lots of free time and Risu and everyone else is here. It’s great having somewhere to have fun; it’s not like any of them are graduating anyway.

(That’s… that’s why he came here. Because if anything happens to any of his classmates, he’ll know he didn’t have anything to do with it. He belongs between the weak sorcerers for more than just his magic.)

Risu isn’t there when he gets to the classroom. He’s not exactly the type to hustle, Aikawa can count on one hand the amount of times he’s seen him pick up a book after school hours. It’s not that weird for him to be late.

He kills time talking to anyone else who’ll listen, but the bell rings once, twice, and there’s still no trace of Risu.

“So he’s not coming?” he asks no one in particular, stretching out in his seat.

Takeo looks up from the notebook in front of him. “Risu? I haven’t seen him since Tuesday. I thought you’d know where he was.”

“Well, that sucks,” Aikawa sighs. “… Guess I’ll have to check up on him.”

“Right now? We’ve got a huge test next class!”

“Yup! Do well for me!”

Against all odds, Risu doesn’t have many enemies. But the jobs he takes on for the crosseyes can always go south, and it’s common knowledge that visible cross marks gets unlucky bastards killed if they happen to pass by the wrong place. He’s clever, fast and strong, there’s not many people who could take him out. But Aikawa is his partner, there’s nothing wrong with making sure he’s alright!

(There’s nothing wrong with wanting to see him.)

At this point, he knows the way to Risu’s house by heart. Where to cut through to make it there faster, the place Risu buys his groceries at, the noodle shop they have breakfast at on weekends and the newspaper stand they can’t pass in front of anymore, not since they dropped the guy’s entire stack that one time.

Aikawa has walked there from school and many other places countless times, he knows exactly how little it takes; there’s not much point in rushing. And yet he makes it to the door in half the time.

Just a few months back, Risu gave him a copy of his keys. He told him clearly that it was for emergencies only , and that if any food went missing he would take it back immediately. But he's never said anything the countless times Aikawa has let himself in just to watch TV and wait for him, even forgave him for overwatering his cacti half to death that one time!

(He distinctly remembers always holding two pairs of keys. One for his own house, one for somewhere that felt like home. Jiggling together in his pocket, in the same chain. He’d never get them wrong, back then.)

Keys out, he knocks on the door just for good measure. No sound comes out the other side. It takes a twist, a pull he had to learn by himself the first time he used it and hone with time, but the door opens easily enough.

Inside, nothing is much dirtier than it was the last time he came by.

“Risu, you here?” he calls, closing the door behind.

“Yeah,” comes back from the only room. Aikawa feels his shoulders relax. “Shouldn’t you be in class?”

“Takeo said he hadn’t heard from you in days, had to come check,” pocketing the keys, he makes his way to the bed. The dirty bed with a dried red stain in the sheets, where Risu sits barely up. Split lip, bandaged gut and black eye. “Dude, what happened to you?”

“Ah, things went out of control. Shit happens,” he shrugs. “I’m fine, though. Just need to sleep it off a bit more.”

Even if he swears to keep Risu away from dangerous business, to keep him alive through them, at least… the truth is that anything can happen while he isn’t around. That it doesn’t matter what he does when he can’t always be there.

Partners are meant to watch each other’s backs, and… maybe they stay as nothing more than a promise for a reason (Aikawa doesn’t have a foundation on which to build upon. Has nowhere to keep his promises, balanced blindly out- everything falls when his arms stop responding. Catching them in free fall or picking up the pieces will never be enough. They are partners in word alone, and Aikawa has never been great at keeping those).

Sitting at the edge of the bed doesn’t make his chest any lighter. Neither does reaching for the crusty wound dressing. Risu doesn’t flinch.

Judging by the bleeding, the wound doesn’t seem like a big deal- no wound one can simply sleep off is, really. Still-

“… Sorry I wasn’t there to help.”

Risu snorts, then, focing Aikawa to look up from the old stain. But he doesn’t need to reach his eyes to know, by heaving alone, that he’s pissed .

“What? You think I need you to protect me?” he growls, sitting up against the wall.

Not even their silent truce can stay in place forever, it never has. Not when the things Aikawa needs to tell Risu are the ones that enrage him the most. His best attempt at honesty is never enough, will never make Risu see him, deep down, as anything other than a liar (but that’s exactly what he is, isn’t it?).

“That’s not what I-” he tries anyway, facing Risu’s brutal eyes head-on, letting them carve into his own.

“Look, asshole,” Risu continues, pointing stiff hands to himself. “I’m alive; I can look after myself just fine .”

“Come on, I meant partners are supposed to look out for each other!”

And, the way everything does, that only makes his frown deeper, darker: “Well, you never ask me for help with whatever it is you do when you disappear,” maybe Aikawa is the one with a gaping wound on the side. “I think we’re even.”

… What’s he supposed to reply? What’s he supposed to do ?

His gaze falls painful on the bed, loses trace of Risu inside every wrinkle in the sheets, and why the hell does everything gotta be so damn hard ?

“Risu, it’s…” (Why can’t things suck for him alone?) “... It’s not that simple.”

“Yeah? But it doesn’t matter ‘cos that’s all you ever say.”

In the end, Risu looks for somewhere else to stare into, and Aikawa doesn’t try to follow.

Standing up and leaving would be the best thing to do, he knows. Has done it countless times before (Risu doesn’t move any closer to the wall, doesn’t move at all, even with Aikawa’s hands so close to him still.

Why can’t he just pull away? If they’re partners on word alone, if Risu has what it takes to make a living for himself, all on his own? When things will never change no matter how much time goes by, how long they waste. When Aikawa can never be his partner, not for real ?). 

Neither of them speak, and this time the solution isn’t clear at all.

5

Even in the dark, Risu’s place is more comfortable than his own. The first floorboard into the bathroom is loose, the window on the back is better left alone (Aikawa learned this the hard way, when he moved the glass panel one inch to the right and the whole thing went crashing down the other side. Risu wasn’t very happy with his new pizza box curtain), the water service sucks ass on Mondays, if it even works at all, and the first right burner on the stove doesn’t light up no matter what.

Aikawa has his own toothbrush sitting in a cup on the sink. He’s caught Risu wearing his socks and getting only a well you never took them back when questioned, and taken justice on his own hands by stealing some of Risu’s right out his drawers when he’s not looking.

Midnight or noon, it makes sense he’d know this place best. Overflowing trash cans, faulty orange lights.

If prompted, he’d swear that he finds most things faster digging through drawers packed full of junk than he does in the empty cabinets of his own kitchen. That he’d rather drink the occasional glass of murky brown water than sit on the solid lone couch in his living room.

He can’t get away with it every day, of course, or Risu would start trying to split the rent, but getting to stare out into that ugly popcorn ceiling always marks the end of a good day.

But it’s not about the devil channels, the poorly hidden beers in the fridge or the functional microwave. No matter how much he hates his own apartment, he could fill it with all those things and more, if we really wanted to. Spending time there, listening his every move echo twice as loud, it wouldn’t be fixed just by closing in the empty space (because the truth is nothing there will ever belong to him, not fully).

It’s Risu. It’s never been hard to admit.

The only thing that makes him more , what can’t ever be blurred out by something else’s will, what can’t ever be a front to cover its tracks… is their partnership.

Risu looks him in the eye, calls him by the name he picked for himself and it’s like there was never any other (Risu holds their unofficial partnership in the way everyone else does their beating contracts and this might be the only proof that Aikawa exists at all).

Lots of shit happens, and it’s not unusual for people to forget whole chunks of their childhood, so Aikawa isn’t worried at all (he has vague smells glued deep in his nose, the remnants of stray sentences that found a way to stick but that barely mean anything anymore. There’s no need for any of them now). But he knows he thought no one would take him, back then. Partnership or otherwise. Not in a place he didn’t belong. And he thought he’d never take anyone, too, when he was finally the person he always hoped he’d be.

It’s a lame thing to think about now. With Risu’s shoulder stabbing into the side of his head and half his back ready to drop over the edge of the bed if he lies flat on it.

Honestly, he did this to himself.

Risu’s bed wasn’t made to fit two people their size, nevermind comfortably . That’s why Aikawa is used to taking the air mattress even when they plan to chat away most of the night. He enjoys the cramped closeness on the occasion, though, enough to push Risu aside when he insists he should get off the bed already. So, even though he could , he doesn’t move or forcefully take up space. If only ‘cause waking Risu up is more trouble than it’s worth.

He has to leave at some point, if he plans to sleep at all, but he can handle the snoring and stinging pain on his temple for a little longer if it means he gets warmth nothing else can provide.

Ending today like this, it just makes sense.

Aikawa came looking for Risu in the morning, had no real plans in store but that’s never been much of a problem. But Risu wasn’t there. Their usual ramen spot was his next best bet, and not trying to come up with further options paid off when he found him. Aikawa made him sit there and cover for his own breakfast- he wasn’t particularly hungry, as he had had breakfast before going out, but it seemed like the right retribution (when he told Risu this, hours later, he got a heavy handed push and a promise to eat out without him more often).

After a while of walking around, they caught a poster for the movie they kept talking about on TV and decided to give it a go, though Aikawa couldn’t remember what it was about if he tried. When the time for lunch came, he dragged Risu away from yet another one of their cheap go-tos and led him to a somewhat fancier place, not entirely sure if they'd be able to ever come back.

“Damn, what’s the occasion?” Risu asked over the menu, doing nothing to hide his mocking tone. Then, lower: “Seriously, man. We’ll have to leave this place through the window.”

“Nah,” Aikawa decided then. “Not this time.”

(That thing can’t kill its body, right? No matter how much Aikawa spends there’ll be more money in his pockets next time. There’s no reason to take care of it.)

The rest of the day proved just as fun. Filled with endless chatting and excuses he doesn’t need to slip an arm around Risu’s shoulders. Eventually they ended here, skipped dinner in favor of cheap beer and snacks and staying the night came as natural as it could’ve been.

Today was great. The kind of day that makes him glad he’s living life the way he was always meant to, no matter the cost.

… Still, he just can’t dose off as easily as he should.

It’s not the dull pain where Risu’s bones stick into his own; it certainly isn’t the snoring or the half of his back the blanket doesn’t reach. It’s frostbite. A shift in gravity; it’s-

It’s the faint light seeping through the curtains swirling, shaping into the sharpest of blades.

Head beating twice his pulse, everything around him turns into a vacuum. Dark, soundless; blinding, deafening. All at once while the nails digging at the top of his head are the only thing keeping blood, eyes, brain, in place.

But that never lasts long.

There’s no way to stop a flood and there’s no way to stop it . Water and mud pull back only on their own accord; someone nailed to the wake of its tide should be used to being pulled underwater (beyond drowned lungs and red eyes. Beyond waiting for air to finally flow back in). Rocks and thorns dig deep inside his skin and fighting a whirlpool is a losing battle. One he shouldn’t consider fighting.

Years of sleeping in the streets turn anyone into a light sleeper, and Risu is no exception. Aikawa can’t even fix himself a midnight snack on a good night.

He still rolls out of bed as slowly as possible, if only because any other sound would make his headache even worse (taking a moment to recover from the agonizing spin, Risu’s outline blurs into everything else and he hates having to sneak out like this. No stupid good morning to reply to, no fighting over the shower. No chatting their way out the complex or fetching his mail just to snoop around). When he’s done, he picks up his shoes, zips up his hoodie in one single painful screech, and that’s enough to twist his face into a grimace.

In the middle of it, he knocks into the windowsill, pots clicking thunder against each other.

“Shit,” he mumbles, pushing them back to safety in the same way he does his own skull.

Blankets shift a couple meters away, and the damage is done. “Aikawa?”

If Aikawa had to guess, he’d say Risu is more sluggish than he is annoyed. Which is as good as it gets (it doesn’t make turning around any easier, though).

“... Sorry, I-” he starts, only managing it halfway as the pressure in his temple finds its way down to his lungs. “I have to go.”

His heartbeat reaches his eardrums just to crush them flat, his bones threaten to start breaking down any second, jet back blood, thorn flesh.

“It’s fine,” Risu sighs. “But don’t ‘forget’ your shirt this time ‘cos I’m not washing it for free again.”

He holds it out for a second, launches it straight into Aikawa’s shoulder right when he makes the first move to go for it and faceplants the pillow with a groan.

Standing one step away from the small living room, Aikawa has everything he needs to leave. His own body won’t stop tormenting him until he gives in to that thing’s will, and it may not get angry, may not resent him, but it sure as hell gets impatient .

And though he’s used to stopping in his tracks as soon as it demands, Aikawa is not weak. A minor rebellion is something he can afford once in a while.

So he erases the distance to the bed once more, no matter how loud every step flows up his head, and kisses the back of Risu’s head till he tenses up the smallest bit beneath him. His cue to pull back, dizzying, and push a heavy hand on his head, keeping right there against the pillow.

“Wash your hair,” he tells him, holding him down just a second longer.

Risu doesn’t give him enough time to pull his hand away before he shoves him. “Shut up, asshole.”

Once more, for the last time, Aikawa turns around. It’s like the ground shakes below his feet, spins endlessly into glass shards and nails and thorns. Everyone, everything’s patience has its limits.

The crackling coming from his spine has nothing to do with curling up uncomfortably on a bed he doesn’t fit in.

“If you take shit from the fridge on your way out again I’ll kill you,” Risu warns as Aikawa reaches the door.

“Guess you’ll find out in the morning!”

The door opens, closes like a gunshot. Ringing deep in his ears long after it’s done, as he takes a moment to breathe in, back flat against it.

“Would you fucking stop ?” he grumbles, taking the final step down the stairs, rushing out the door despite the agonizing pain.

Not even when it ends, at last, one final, torturous stretch; when he floats, enveloped in numbing aftermath, do his ribs stop stabbing crushed lungs.

.

.

.

+1

Curse magic. Curse magic of all fucking things.

When Risu said he’d try his luck with one of En’s machines, Aikawa didn’t think anything would come back from it. Why the hell would it? He laughed and told Risu not to waste his money on pointless junk. Of course Risu rolled his eyes at him and called him a stick in the mud (he went back to smiling soon after. All dismissive and I have a good feeling about it ).

But Aikawa didn’t buy it. That it would serve any purpose, that Risu would go through with it at all.

… Or, rather, he hoped nothing would change.

No one ever saw Risu produce a single smoke particle, and he had had plenty of opportunities to wake dormant smoke veins for good, with how many dangerous missions he took on for the crosseyes. It didn’t make sense that he’d suddenly find out he wasn’t a useless sorcerer!

(Aikawa really wanted to be hopeful like him. Look forward to gut feelings and the chance of a greater life. Who wouldn’t want such a thing for their partner?

… Maybe Risu thought he was jealous.)

He seriously thought Risu would forget- that something would come up and he wouldn’t have the money for it anymore. As they hung out on the rooftop, he asked himself why he even worried at all. Spending so much time taking every factor into account, digging up knowledge from where he himself swore to keep it just to study every possibility? When Risu would come back with some worse than average readings on some generic transformation smoke, at best ?

Weak magic is better than no magic at all. Maybe not for improvement, but at least for the illusion of it.

If things had turned out like that, Aikawa would’ve apologized for his skepticism and made sure they celebrated properly, or something. Hell, he planned to take him out even if they gave him the shittiest results!

… Instead, Risu walked straight to him one morning, wearing a poorly concealed smile that broke out as soon as he reached Aikawa’s side and said the worst possible thing.

I’ll tell only you , he said, and this double edged sword Aikawa had been keeping at bay between them, scratch, nip, cut, snapped out his grip with a carnivorous mind of its own.

I’ll tell only you , he said, turning on a timer. Tying Aikawa’s hands behind his back. Painting a fucking taget in every inch of his body and handing that thing a gutting knife. The only thing Aikawa can’t win against.

“What do you even do with that?” he asked Risu, then. Treading carefully around the words like it served any purpose. “No one knows a thing about it.”

Alone in his apartment that night, he thought of long-settled inevitability. Of blurry acceptance he always said he’d face, and the long list of consequences for everything he did outside the muddied path it made cold sense to walk.

He always knew the day would come. Hardly a surprise. More his own hands ripping away brick after brick than a wall giving in to an earthquake.

… But not like this. Never like this.

Was it so stupid to think they could live their separate lives? That if Aikawa didn’t stick his head in any of its business then he’d be allowed the same courtesy? (It was, of course it was. That thing, whatever it is, isn’t a human or a magic user, isn’t a person . How would it know what a deal or kindness even is?)

Aikawa was always its puppet; it has no reason to keep the peace when he can’t ever tamper with it. He’d bet it doesn’t know what keeping the peace even is. Greedy piece of shit, leeching on foolish hopes for its own gain.

It never bothered him before. A deal, a sacrifice. But Risu is going to die now and there’s nothing he can do.

The timers don’t stop, and though he can’t see them, he knows they’re inching close to the end. Irreparably so.

How’s he supposed to warn Risu? When his best bet was to tell him to stay away from the crosseyes, to listen for the first fucking time, and it only made him stomp away? Wouldn’t even take him seriously when he held him by the collar. A gut punch, a kick and a what the fuck’s gotten into you?

It took over once since then, already. In the early hours of the morning of the very next day Risu told him about his magic.

He tried keeping it away, inside somehow, but it is never powerless in the way Aikawa is. It wasn’t a warning or a message. It knows what Aikawa can do and isn’t interested in playing stupid games.

So he knows all the clocks mark the next time. Whenever that is.

Looking after Risu this way is a weird thing; it’s his own hands he’s trying to protect him from but staying away doesn’t seem like the right idea. Trying to keep him away from the crosseyes is the only thing he can attempt but bringing it up makes him stop listening. They’re spending time together like usual but Aikawa can’t enjoy any of it.

Following Risu to get orders feels like a death sentence for the both of them. He hears his voice reply to Risu but he can’t remember a thing any of them say.

“Alright, I’ll be back,” Risu’s echo says. He finds himself nodding long after he’s climbed the stairs.

That thing took over once already since Risu told him about his magic. Aikawa braced himself, closed his eyes hard and Risu was the first person he ran into when he woke up. Safe and sound; away from the crosseyes. But it wouldn’t ignore rare magic, much less one right within reach. Ticking clocks turn into blaring alarms and Aikawa’s hands may as well have been cut.

“Sorry, man,” Risu says when he gets back. “You can’t come today.”

And though he hears it loud, clear, freezing - and though he knows what it means, somewhere deep down… his eardrums blare white noise, his foreign words are pieced together from this morning and yesterday and months back. It’s not a headache, it’s not it , but he waves goodbye and walks away on legs that don’t feel his.

… The next thing he knows is that it’s over.

The heaviest knife his hands have ever held, the thickest blood that’s ever stained his skin. There’s nothing left to do (sharp shadows, silent scream, torn flesh, there never was).

Risu is dead. Risu is dead because he wouldn’t listen to reason (Risu is dead because he chose the worst possible partner, and he’s dead because Aikawa couldn’t help him. Not even when it mattered the most- because it was this time that mattered the most).

He tried to fight it (he walked away when Risu told him to. Voice, pace no different but still so foreign , as much himself as he is sitting in a coffin with his ears full of mud. Numb), and he failed. There’s nothing he can do.

There isn’t .

Soon all this will be just another nightmare.

… A real one. Far more than any of the others. One that left a real hole in the life he’s allowed to live. Haunting and irreplaceable. Big enough to bring it all crashing down. Can he find a way to fill it in, whatever it is, or is it better to leave it all for something else? Though, maybe he’d rather not wake up.

But Aikawa’s good at pretending, he has to be.

So what’s pretending Risu got tired of him and left like he always knew he would? What’s shrugging it off the way he’s done so many other things? What’s erasing years off his memory, what’s forgetting once again?

Right in the middle of all the buzzing, he catches Risu’s voice. Sudden, crooked, cutting through the thick bubbles. And this is curse magic. Hate, bloodlust, revenge . Rising taller, stronger, than that thing will ever be.

Of course this is Risu’s magic , he thinks, everything but that dark, foggy outline blurred out of view. If it were up to him, if this body was his own for just a second, he’d fix himself firmly on the ground and look Risu’s curse in the eyes ( thank you. I’m sorry ).

And it’s not but he closes in, leaves no one in his wake and no matter how long it takes, Aikawa’s sure he will come and end this all.

That thing will drag him with it anywhere it goes; he’ll never live the life he so desperately wanted, the life he wished to enjoy, and that’s fine. Because he lived enough for someone who shouldn’t have lived this long, because Risu gave him the closest taste of life and so it must be him who takes it all away. The way Aikawa let it happen to him.

I’m sorry. Thank you , he mouths to himself in that short moment of second-hand surprise before his eyes are taken away. From Risu, from the vanishing door.

Nails, teeth find a way to dig deep into his skin no matter how fast it runs. I’ll take everything from you, flows in through the cracks, rings radio static smooth.

Dripdrop to heavy rain, Aikawa smiles.