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The beige walls of Kota’s shared room start to resemble TV static more and more as he keeps glaring at the ceiling. Normally, when he can’t sleep, he’ll put his earbuds in and roll over on his memory foam mattress. Considering how much hell and high water he went through to get permission to have his own mattress instead of the rock-hard cots of the Assassin’s Guild, he made sure he would always get a good sleep on whatever mattress he chose. However, it’s one of those nights that the ever-present voices keep increasing in volume, until even his music can’t drown them out. His sleep playlist isn’t cutting it, so Kota rolls over, grabs his phone off the nightstand, and switches to another playlist. First song, right off the bat, is Supernova by Dylan Rockoff. He takes his phone with him, immediately rolling over to lay on his back again.
“I call my ma...”
Or he would, if he had remembered to ask for the home phone number before she put him on that plane to England.
“No, nothing’s wrong, I just wanna talk
To hear her voice
And feel so small like when I was young…”
Even when he was young, he was alone. Mom and dad worked six to eight just to afford enough food for them, Kota, and his three younger siblings at the time. He doesn’t hate them, hell no. However, his parents only really paid attention to him until he was five, when having four children became almost too much to handle financially. They left him to get himself and his siblings to school, the twenty-five minute walk down some of the sketchiest backstreets because it was preferable to the ten minute walk on the side of a highway. He became adept in the kitchen real fast, and was an expert in elementary school subjects and childcare. He knew how to protect himself, too, often coming home in later years with a couple dollars in his pocket from muggings gone wrong. Bullies would see the scrawny seven-year-old elf they’ve heard so much about, and thought- “Hey, this kid ain’t shit! In fact, I’ll be the best around town for being able to one-up him!” Except, even at seven, his elven traits were exceptional, and he learned how to take down someone twice his age with minimal scrapes. However, he didn’t let it go to his head, and refused to pick a fight if it could be avoided. After developing a bit of a reputation, most of his fights consisted of protecting others from bullies, often walking away paid because he either a) took it from said bully, or b) couldn’t dissuade someone from attempting to thank him. During the summer after fifth grade, a couple weeks before July, his parents sat him down. They explained that four kids, with a fifth on the way, was too much financially. They said they had just enough money saved to buy him two plane tickets: one from Italy to England, and another from England to America. After it sunk in, they expected tears, shouting, denial, refusal. What they got, however, was calm acceptance. Kota knew something had to give soon: he’d seen the increasing eye bags and ever-rising strain his parents were under. Even at ten, he knew he would be the most likely to make it all by himself. So, he agreed, and prepared himself. As little as it was worth, he spent the next couple of weeks before his birthday with his siblings at the library. While he tried to learn English, he amused the kids by creating chibi creatures from the water in the water bottle he snuck in.
“I wanna know
I’m not on my own, ‘cause I feel alone
Yeah, I’ve got love
More than enough, but is it too much?”
Kota is well aware he’s not on his own. Even over the music, he can hear his best friend and roommate’s snores. He met Ren on the plane from England to America. At the time, she had been a scowling and frightened seven-year-old who had been assigned the seat next to him. Always a people-pleaser, Kota tapped her shoulder to introduce himself. “Hi! I’m Kota! I love your eyes, oh my god, they’re adorable! What’s your name?”
The girl in question was heterochromatic, a brown left eye and green right eye. That got her to smile- well, the scowl lessened in intensity. “Emily,” she answered. “And your voice sounds weird. Are you from here?”
Kota laughed. “No, I’m from Italy. It’s a couple countries over, and my voice has a thing called an ‘accent’ to it. It’s basically how I pronounce words in Italian! Here, look- questo è il suono dell’italiano!” (This is the sound of Italian!)
The ice broken, the two talked the whole eight hour flight. When they walked off the plane, Kota would have bet that the two of them would be friends forever, if not siblings in everything but blood.
Turning on his phone in the present time and rolling over on his right side to face the wall, Kota unlocked his phone and opened his messaging app. His girlfriend Li wasn’t online, due to the fact that she was literally dead. Well, not dead-dead, as there was still a chance she could be resurrected from that magic blast that hit her two months ago. In theory, her and Akari, his other best friend (also got hit. Li, in all her heroic stubbornness, leapt in front of the first blast. The only reason the two of them aren’t dead-dead yet is because the person wielding the blast redirected last second, around Li and to Akari, both of them sharing the full blast.) could be saved. In practice and history, it’s never been done before. This was Kota’s weekly attempt to get a couple hours of sleep so he didn’t completely lose his mind while trying to puzzle out how to keep two people sort-of alive as long as possible, on top of him and Ren not dying, on top of managing his other two friends who fell into a funk so bad they don’t get out of bed most days, and on top of researching how to resurrect people. He knows he has support, but those voices keep up a constant hissing of “Do you? Do you really? Or are you just imagining things to make reality hurt less?”
“I don’t wanna spread too thin
Breaking my back to keep too many friends
I need them to need me around
To be an audience for my breakdowns…”
Kota will make himself pure elastic if that’s what it takes to keep from spreading too thin. If it needs to be done, damn it he’ll get it done, even if it kills him. The one thing that is keeping him from snapping and giving up is the constant presence of his friends. His friends, his girlfriend, who live in the back of his head and whisper that they love and need him, that they’re counting on him. If they didn’t need him as much as he needs them, what would be the point of everything then?
“ ‘Cause I
Don’t wanna be the center of the universe
Carrying the world hurts…”
Kota muffles a self-indulgent snicker at that. If his mental stability and well-being were people, he’s sure they would resemble old grandmas- hitting him with their purses while yelling at him for ignoring their importance.
“I’m getting tired…”
Kota doesn’t stop yawning as he pores over books, or spars with a despondent Ren, or stumbles his way to the mess hall for his number-whatever cup of sugar-loaded coffee of the day. Kota rolls over to his left side, facing Ren’s wall. It’s covered in photographs of their friends, both in and out of the Guild, and random plants from her’s and Kota’s frequent walks in the forest behind the building the Guild is underneath.
“And I
I’d settle for Jupiter
The gravity on Earth works
All the time, and so do I
So, I find my way to the edge
For some perspective on the universe…”
Kota muffles another snicker- he’s sure the Earth’s gravity has a lesser paycheck and a lesser stress level than him. He’s slightly envious of it.
“Did you know
A supernova only glows after it explodes
That’s a fact
I hold on to when panic attacks
Hmm-mm…”
Uh, excuse you, Kota’s skin glows just fine, thank you very much. And he’s pretty sure he hasn’t exploded yet. But if he does, then it’ll be as colorful and vibrant as his language and as pretty as his girlfriend is (hint: very). Adjusting the left earbud, Kota rolls over onto his back before bending at the waist to sit up in the middle of the queen-sized mattress, criss-cross applesauce style. He runs his hands over the covers, looking for his phone. He tossed it somewhere a couple minutes ago, and now he has no idea where it went.
“ ‘Cause I don’t wanna spread too thin
Breaking my back to keep too many friends
I give myself the space that I need
And leave the atmosphere to finally breathe…”
Another snicker. Kota doesn’t even take breaks to shower most days, and he hasn’t cut his hair since before Akari and Li bit the dirt. It has gone from a short, fluffy hairstyle to his collarbones- low enough for him to put his greasy (he flinches whenever he runs a hand through his hair. His hair is his pride and joy) hair in a low ponytail to keep it out of his face while he’s reading.
“ ‘Cause I
Don’t wanna be the center of the universe
Carrying the world hurts
I’m getting tired
And I
I’d settle for Jupiter
The gravity on Earth works
All the time, and so do I
So, I find my way to the edge
For some perspective on the universe…”
“Oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oooooh…”
Kota found his phone. He pressed the power button and winced, temporarily blinded by the brightness before turning it down. A glance at the clock on his lock screen confirms that it’s only been ten minutes since he laid down at three am. Sighing, he opens his phone and heads straight for his Notes app to review what he knows about resurrection.
“ ‘Cause I don’t wanna spread too thin
Breaking my back to keep too many friends…”
He should stop by the house again, make sure Aoiro and Renjiro haven’t accidentally starved themselves to death.
“Yeah, I need them to need me around
To be an audience for my breakdowns
‘Cause I
Don’t wanna be the center of the universe
Carrying the world hurts
I’m getting tired
And I
I’d settle for Jupiter
The gravity on Earth works
All the time, and so do I
So, I find my way to the edge
Yes, I find my way to the edge
For some perspective on the universe”
Kota sighs. It’s one of those sighs that reaches its fingers all the way into the far corners of Kota’s soul. It’s one of those sighs that literally breathes how exhausted he is, how worried he is, and all of the emotions he’s been holding back in front of the lower-ranked assassin’s looking up to him for training tips, in front of his superior’s looking down on him for his attitude and sass, in front of his friend’s looking to him for guidance and a solution that doesn’t require losing someone else. Kota tosses his head back closes his eyes for a count of five before he gets up, knees and ankles crackling in anger at him, before he quietly sneaks out of his shared room and Top Five common room to head to the kitchen and grab a cup of coffee and energy drink, before heading back to the sofa facing the fire that he claimed the first time he walked in to the Top Five wing after being promoted. Setting everything down on the coffee table separating the fireplace and sofa, he crouches down, winces as his knees creak, and stokes the fire back to life. He stands up, catches his pinky toe on the couch, and folds into the corner before picking up a book and immersing himself into research once more.