Work Text:
“Hello?”
“Hello? Anyone?”
Noriaki was alone. A vast emptiness surrounded him and made him feel tiny and overshadowed. Cold and hungry. He couldn’t see himself when he looked down. He couldn’t see his hands as he held them in front of his face. It was wrong in all sorts of ways but all he could do was recount in vague remembrance of what his world once was, a blue sky and green grass, maybe a building or two in the distance. This was that place again, wasn’t it? He’d been here many times. Deja vu struck him force as he recalled himself traversing these lands, afraid and alone, but walking on, floating on nonetheless, guided by the sheer will of his curiosity and hunger for knowledge, always having the urge to grasp his situation.
But it was always this melody in his head, playing over and over again, till all he could sing was this tune. It wasn’t sickening, don’t get him wrong, and it always had a sense of unfamiliarity to it, even if it’s all Noriaki’s been hearing. He was hearing it yet again, and he felt as uneasiness crept up his spine as he struggled to find something concrete, anything - it couldn’t be nothing, nowhere, but everything, everywhere at once.
This was his home. It has always been his home. It beckoned to him when he was awake, and came to him in his sleep. He didn’t have anywhere else to go, but he disliked being there. It was terribly uncomfortable existing in such a place, albeit he had nothing to worry about, as it was safe, and till then it had never allowed anything hostile to get to him. But maybe it was that. He knew reality was far too harsh to not make him fight for his survival; it couldn’t be his home, somewhere where he felt almost too protected, almost too safe, so much so that he felt suffocated.
But this was the only place he knew this well. As he twisted his neck to look further, he couldn’t tell if this was up or down, left or right. He had no ground beneath him, couldn’t tell if he was a second away from falling or about to climb. He couldn’t feel, he couldn’t breathe.
The safety made him feel sick. He couldn’t take it anymore.
Noriaki awoke with a sob, a terrible ache in his chest that scratched his core. He looked around and in the faint moonlight sliding in through the windows, he could make out the outlines of his hand, his body, his hair, his bedsheet, everything. After that place that he’s been in so many times, it was jarring to be so present in waking moments. This also made him uneasy, but it reminded him that he was real, that the void wasn’t. Every time he was in there, he expected to know he was dreaming, but never did he realize it was all in his head till he suddenly opened his eyes. He would do everything to not go there again, somewhere where opposites were his reality. It was good and bad, a complete gray area where nothing and everything existed, coinciding, living in harmony but in darkness, unable to interact with each other. They just knew they were there.
In reality, that place horrified Noriaki. A reality like that, where it was impossible to even die, scared him even more than death. He’d been having dreams like this since he was a child, and that made him even more afraid to die. It wasn’t because of the excruciating pain that he didn’t want to succumb to death, it was because of this place. It was both heaven and hell, an in between that he never seemed to erase from his mind. No matter how good of a person he tried to be, this place always ended up capturing him, as if proving heaven didn’t exist individually. It was this place that made up for it. Although it was far from an ideal heaven - because nobody would ever be reluctant to go to such a place.
Coming on this trip with the people that gave him a purpose, it was the best thing he could wish for, but was it? He wasn’t having second thoughts, but it was just a persistent itch in his brain that he could very well end up in that place, in the in between that has been luring him for all his life. He knew it was just a dream, but it was so haunting. It was so unhappy, so elating and otherworldly. It was so safe but it felt dangerous in spikes. Knowing about such a place, even if it was imaginary, shattered his heart. He couldn’t go there, he simply couldn’t. But yet, it was almost like he was subconsciously setting himself up for it. He damn well knew that he was gonna die, but still he kept fighting on with a relatively strong will to live - at least that’s what he wanted to think, anyway. There were countless times where Jotaro had saved him when he expected to perish, so he just wondered, maybe Jotaro was his way out? Maybe he could pull him away from that place, far far away, so that one day he wouldn’t even have a lasting memory of that place, one that reminded him of how alone he felt? He would just remember it as a bad dream, not one that carried feelings of his lonely childhood till he met Jotaro. Not one that made him feel left out, like the weird kid that talked to the green ghost at his side.
“Kakyoin?”
“Oh, hey Jotaro,” Noriaki snapped out of his mind-racing trance and quickly looked to his right, where Jotaro lay, motionless but eyes gleaming in the moonlight.
“You’re crying?”
Noriaki suddenly was aware of the tears streaming down his face, icy and plentiful. They dripped down his chin. “Oh, I’m sorry- I’m not.”
Jotaro didn’t look impressed. “Let me rephrase that. Why are you crying?”
He wouldn’t get it. He really wouldn’t. But Noriaki couldn’t help but feel it was right to tell him. He was gonna die after all.
“I keep having this dream,” he started. He really didn’t know how to talk about this, although he was well-spoken mostly. Before he could continue, he watched as Jotaro straightened up and made his way over to him. It shocked and excited him, he couldn’t contain himself. Finding such a worthy friend to die for maybe was worth it after all. He beamed as more tears forced their way out, as if his chest was being squeezed to wring them out of him, like a wet cloth. It hurt.
Jotaro awkwardly looked at him, and this was the moment that defined Jotaro’s feelings - he cared a lot, but didn’t know how to show it. Noriaki laughed, and hands automatically reached out to Jotaro. He knew he’d push him away, and maybe that’d make him cry more, or just die then and there. But he couldn’t, he absolutely couldn’t, because he was terrified of that place. He couldn’t find himself there, not again. The dream he had a few minutes ago flashed by his eyes and he was grief stricken, unable to swallow his words before they came out.
But to his surprise, Jotaro didn’t push him away. He felt arms wrap around him and pull him closer, which made him gasp as he leaned into Jotaro. It was familiar to his dream - a void, he couldn’t see. But it wasn’t composed of opposites. He only felt safe, and he felt elation swell up in his chest, making his arms tighten around Jotaro more. He smelled something that could only be described as Jotaro, and he filled himself with it. It made him replace memories of that place with this. Whatever you’d call this. It felt like heaven. Individual, warm heaven.
“What sort of dream is it?”
He felt Jotaro’s voice’s vibrations, and he embraced him even tighter, if that was even possible. A brief thought occurred to him - he couldn’t believe Jotaro was holding him like this, the delinquent, the guy who never showed his emotions, but he knew that was himself being shallow. Of course Jotaro cared. He knew it from the day they met, when he saved his life even though he tried to kill him. He would be dead if Jotaro wasn’t kind. He wouldn’t ever have experienced such an ethereal place in Jotaro’s arms, and instead he’d have gone to the in between, the hauntingly beautiful world in his dreams.
Noriaki pulled away slightly so Jotaro could hear him. “It’s like… It’s like I’m existing, but not existing, in this sort of vast nothingness, where I’m feeling everything but not everything at the same time.”
Jotaro listened carefully, and he was quiet. Noriaki took this time to lean back into him, coming back to experience more of what erased his irrational but rational fears. Then he heard Jotaro rumble, “I see.”
He was content with that, but Jotaro seemed to struggle with his wording a bit. He could tell from this up close as his chest rose in a few short breathes - if he were further away he’d think Jotaro was being his usual quiet self. “It sounds scary.”
Noriaki was smiling, but the fear of that place was still there, albeit covered by this newfound peace. He nodded at Jotaro’s words. “It is. I’m worried I’ll go there when I die, and once I do, I won’t ever get to escape.”
He laughed, and a few tears dried into Jotaro’s nightshirt. He wasn’t even concerned about whether Jotaro would think he’s silly, because either way it’d be okay as long as he gets to breathe in this place a little longer. But he needn’t think anything because Jotaro supported him all the same, saying, as he slowly explored Noriaki’s back, “You don’t have to worry. I’ll find you there.”
Noriaki was taken aback, and he pulled away, surveying Jotaro’s face with teary eyes. Jotaro looked at him with a solemn expression and he noticed that he had glistening eyes as well, as if he was going to cry, too.
He found himself speechless as Jotaro continued, “I’ll always find you, okay? You have to find me as well.”
Noriaki really didn’t know what to say. He felt touched beyond words, touched someplace nobody even knew existed. Somewhere deep inside his core, Noriaki knew what Jotaro was saying was right. Even if that place ever did become his reality, he could shape it - because if something as incomprehensible as stands existed, so can other simple things like willpower. If he wanted something as bad as he wanted Jotaro, he’d find it there right with him. Moreover, Jotaro was all the positive things about that place in one. With him, he didn’t have to worry about that place at all, he realized, because he was his dream, and he was his unreal heaven, someplace he’d go to rest after he died. After all, where else could he go, meeting someone like him?
He just stared at Jotaro as he felt the hands once on his back reach up to his face, and with one word, “always”, Jotaro was closer than he’d ever been, pressing his soft lips onto his with no audible sound. It was short but it spoke a thousand words, and he knew Jotaro meant to say a lot more things than just that one single word. And he understood all that despite none of their mouths opening or uttering a noise. Noriaki found his hands caressing Jotaro’s cheeks, which were stained with tears - so he wasn’t just about to cry, he was already crying.
Even if he went to an in between where his world was nothing and everything, he would be fine. Because Jotaro was his nothing and everything, only he wasn’t an in between. He was the only.