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Curses don’t scare him. Curses aren’t new to him at all, being gifted with the powers to cause them. He understands why people fear curses though, they bring nothing but pain and suffering. The effects are long lasting. People fear the unknown, it’s why humanity strives to put a label on everything and anything.
But curses aren’t the only things capable of causing pain and suffering.
Shu will never understand the hypocrisy of people who turn a blind eye at the suffering caused by humans but don’t hesitate to condemn the unknown.
What better example than his junior, Uki Violeta?
A child who was sold off by his birth parents just for them to survive, subjected into cruelty at the institution that was supposed to help him. This was no curse or divine intervention.
This was cruelty done by human hands.
It left a scar so bad that Uki is curled into a ball in front him, his powers bursting out of control due to the trauma.
Shu had ran over as fast as he could when he received a text from Fulgur that just said, “Emergency. Uki. Out of control.”, he didn’t think the damage was to this extent. The psychic is curled up in a ball, his powers creating a thin shield between him and the others as it thrashed violently.
All of Noctyx are behind him, Luxiem is sure to be running to the scene but Shu is more worried about Uki. The young man isn’t injured but it looks as if he’s in pain.
The sight of Uki gasping and clutching at his chest makes him uncomfortable.
“Stay back and don’t come closer unless I say so,” Shu tells the other Noctyx members, he knows that there is hesitation but thankfully no one made another move.
Back to the problem at hand. First, he scuttles closer, testing the resistance of Uki’s powers but surprisingly, there was little to none. Shu lets out a sigh, a sense of sadness washes over him.
What did they do to you, Uki?
The sorcerer kneels in front of the psychic, a fond smile on his face. Slowly, he gathers his own magic in his palms, watching his purple fire swirl and twirl around in a ball. Then, he calls out to Uki.
“Uki.. Can you hear me?”
His response is almost inaudible but Shu can hear his soft whimper that called back. From behind him, Alban and Fulgur gasped. But Shu keeps his eyes on Uki.
“Uki, did you know.. People were scared of my sorcery,” A faint memory of townsfolk throwing insults at him, “They still are. But I would never use it to hurt someone,”
That got Uki’s attention. His powers flickers but it started to calm down.
“We get turned away because we were gifted or cursed with these powers,” Shu’s own magic flickered for a moment, “Or it gets out of hand and hurts people unintentionally,”
Uki’s powers began to recede back into him but he’s still shaking from the pain in chest. Shu needs to act fast, the longer he leaves it, the more painful it can get.
“Uki,” He calls out to his counterpart, “Can you look at me?”
The sorcerer can see that Uki is struggling to do so but still, he tries and successfully lifts up his head to look at Shu. There are tears pooling in his eyes and Shu could see that he’s sweating from the pain.
Why does he look resigned with the pain?
“You don’t need to become divine. You’re already enough being yourself. See?,” Shu shows Uki his palms, where his magic has transforms into a miniature galaxy, filled with stars, “This is what the star has blessed you with,”
Instantly, that pulls a reaction from Uki. The psychic’s powers almost fully dissipates as he stares at the galaxy in Shu’s palms, entranced as he was all those years ago under the starry night. Despite being co-workers, Shu can’t help but to care for his juniors differently. All of them went through something traumatic, a different experience than the one he had.
He was given a curse despite having a good life. Uki was given a blessing after a terrible upbringing.
“Uki,” Once again, he calls out to the psychic, the purple-haired man meets his eyes, “Will you let me help you?”
CRACK!
Shu could feel how scared Uki is, still but the shield that manifested from his powers started to crack away.
It’s progress.
The sorcerer opens his arms, eyes softening at Uki’s teary eyes, “I’m not here to hurt you, Uki. I’ll stay here as long as you need,” As it turns out, it wouldn’t take long.
The purple haired psychic lunged at him, wrapping his arms around Shu’s midsection. The sorcerer notes how small he is, being one of the shorter male members of NijiEN. He just wants to wrap Uki in a blanket and make sure he’s protected and cared for forever.
However, there’s something even more crucial that needs to be dealt with.
A thin black tendril protruded from Uki’s back, garbling words into sounds that didn’t make sense. Compared to the ones that he’s seen before — this one is much heavier, its mass coming from years of abuse that Uki went through.
He hates it.
With a silent apology to Uki, he casts a magic circle on his back and sinks his hand into the man. The psychic flinches but his arms tightened around Shu and he takes this as a sign to keep going — so he does. He tries to be quick, looking for the source of the pain.
Seconds later he finds what he’s looking for and he grabs hold of it without wasting any more time, pulling it out of Uki in one motion.
The sight of the black mass almost scares him. It’s much more terrifying than the ones he’d seen before, it’s whispers are louder but made little to no sense at all. It’s unstable, bubbling with raw emotion, almost as if it’s trying to drown everything around it. Shu takes a deep breathe, compacting the mass into a small ball, before he could deal with it himself, a hand reached over from behind him and took it out of his hands.
The sorcerer leans his head back to see that the hand belongs to Vox, who looked at the black ball of mass with intrigue.
“What a nasty thing,”
“Don’t eat that. I’ll get rid of it,” Vox pouts at him but doesn’t argue. This one is too much of a risk.
Shu summons a small portal, allowing Vox to drop the ball inside before closing it. Sigh.
Now that that’s over, he can focus on taking care of Uki. The man in question still has his arms around Shu but he’s no longer shaking from any pain. That’s good, Shu deflates in relief. He gently pushes Uki away, just slightly, to take a good look at his face, noting that there are dried tears on his cheeks.
What an adorable child.
“Are you alright now, Uki?”
It takes Uki a few seconds to reply but Shu can finally relax when he sees the psychic’s eyes focus on him, “Shu.. senpai?”
“Do you know where you are, kiddo?”
“… I was with Noctyx. A—Are they okay? Did I hurt them?”
Shu pats his head, “They’re alright, Uki. Do you still feel any pain?”
Uki sits back fully, blinking owlishly at Shu as he pats his chest in disbelief, “No.. No, it doesn’t hurt any more,”
“That’s good. Everything was taken then,”
“..How’d you do that, Shu-senpai? I usually just.. hide away until it’s over..,”
Shu wants to hug him and never let go.
“It’s just something I’ve learnt over the years but enough about me, I think someone is waiting for you,” The sorcerer scoots out of Uki’s field of vision to give a full view of the other Noctyx members who are standing behind him.
“Uki..” As expected, Fulgur takes the first step forward.
“Fuu fuu-chan..,”
“Uki!” In the end, Alban and Yugo are the ones to run to his side without a second thought. They hug Uki by his sides, rambling and crying about how worried we were, we didn’t know what to do, are you okay?
Sonny seems relieved as well, shoulders hunched over.
Shu giggles and moves to stands, knowing that his work is done here.
But as soon as he stands, his vision starts to spin — he realises too late that he’s falling back and is about to hit the floor like a sack of rocks. He closes his eyes and prays that it won’t hurt too much. He overestimated how far he could take his powers today.
...
..
.
Though as seconds go by, he doesn’t feel any pain. At all. He opens his eyes and to his surprise, Luca has caught him. The mafia boss managed to catch him before he could hit the floor, carrying him in a bridal fashion. It’s at this point that Shu notices that Luxiem is also here. He had sent a message to Vox earlier about the situation but he didn’t expect for everyone to be here.
A fond smile makes its way on his face, what a warm feeling.
“Hi Luca..”
“You almost fainted again, Shu,”
“.. I know, I’m sorry,” Luca’s body heat makes him comfy, slowly lulling him off to sleep.
“Was it bad..?”
“I managed it. It can’t be eaten, I need to get rid of it later,” Quietly, he reassures his beloved. Uki doesn’t need to know how bad it was. Nor do the other Noctyx members.
“You shouldn’t have pushed yourself like that, Shu,”
“Yeah! Imagine if Luca hadn’t been here,”
He didn’t even have the energy to deny Ike and Mysta’s scolding, they’re right — if he’s being honest with himself. But he couldn’t sit by and watch as one of his own suffers.
At that moment, he feels so tired. He used too much energy, the fatigue has started to catch up.
Shu falls asleep at the sound of Noctyx fussing over Uki and Luxiem fussing over him. It’s been years since he’s felt this calm.
The next time he opens his eyes, Shu finds himself in Luca’s bed, the familiar scent of his boyfriend fills his senses. He blinks slowly, recalling the events that happened before he fell off to slumber.
Oh. That’s right.
Uki.
He couldn’t pinpoint what it is but something pushed him to get up, to find Uki as fast as possible. But that’s impossible, his body is suffering too much fatigue to move.
“Shu-senpai..?”
But maybe he didn’t have to.
Shu looks to the side of the bed and sees Uki sitting on the floor with his head perch on top of his arms that are on the bed. He looked as if he was waiting for Shu all this time. With the eyebags under his eyes, Shu is inclined to agree with the notion.
“Uki? What are you doing here?”
“I.. wanted to wait until you woke up. It—It felt like the right thing to do,” For the nth time since meeting Uki, Shu sighs fondly at him.
Deep down, he was still just a kid.
“Uki,” Using what strength he has, he places a hand on the man’s purple hair, giving him soft head pats, “What happened wasn’t your fault,”
“...But you fainted after helping me,”
Shu scoffs.
“I used too much magic but it’s alright. I’d do it over and over again, no matter what you say,” As soon as those words leave Shu, Uki grits his teeth. He's the cause of this, he thinks to himself.
“But it wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for—”
“Uki Violeta,”
Hearing Shu’s stern tone, the psychic meets his eyes. The cool and calm expression that could usually be seen on Shu is nowhere to be seen.
The Shu in front of him is angry but something tells Uki that he isn’t angry at him.
And he’s right. Shu could never be angry at him. He’s angry at the things that Uki has had to go through. Who would do these things to a child?
“You are loved and safe here. I did what I had to because I wanted to, not because I was forced to,” Just like before, he looks at Uki with such a fond expression. It reminds Uki of the look that Nina gives to all of them.
Is that how a parent looks at you?
“...Are you sure?”
“Uki, you’re just as important as anyone else in this ragtag family. So don’t ever think that you’re the problem. I—We love you very much, everything that we do is out of our love for you,” The psychic almost didn’t want to believe it. He never heard these words back at the institution, no one would bat an eye at him or at the treatment he was receiving.
In this world, he’s surrounded by those who love and appreciate him. Maybe that’s why he can cry freely.
“...”
Shu continues giving Uki head pats, even as he cries. He understands what Nina must’ve felt, calling all of them as her kids. He thinks that he knows the reason as he smiles at his counterpart, someone he’d proudly call one of his own.
Feeling the telltale signs of slumber pull at him, Shu scoots over to lie down on his side and gently pulls Uki to lie down with him. Since Uki is much shorter than him, it makes it easier for him to pull Uki into a hug — tucking the younger man’s head under his chin.
Soon enough, they both fall asleep with smiles plastered on their faces as they're enveloped in a warm bubble of love. Shu thanks whatever force puts him in this world and Uki sends a grateful prayer to the stars.
Secretly, Shu also swears to take care of the precious universe in his arms, to keep him safe and protected for as long as he can assure it. His bright star in amidst a curse.