Archive of Our Own ^beta

Aki sat in the living room, grimacing as his head felt like it was getting stabbed, the signs of an incoming headache.

He was home from work earlier than usual. Denji was still in class and Power wouldn’t be home from work for a while.

I should be okay, he thought, closing his eyes as the headache took over him.

The headaches he got blacked out everything from his view and were replaced by a scene, getting the perspective of whatever the vision showed in first person every time. Usually, the images were hazy and he could maybe make out one or two items if he were lucky. The things he saw were all seemingly random objects that didn’t make sense in his life day-to-day.

Today’s vision was no different. In front of him was an empty bench and an ice cream truck parked next to it on the street.

As quick as the pain came, it went away, leaving behind a dull throbbing sensation in Aki’s head.

Tired and confused, he lay down on the couch and fell asleep.

“To the bars, to the bars!” Denji cheered as he busted through the doorway of the Hayakawa residence. He turned 20 today and Aki promised that he would take them out for drinks. He hadn’t stopped talking about it all week.

Hearing that Denji was back, Power burst out of her room and ran to the front of the house, reaching for her shoes.

Startled by the sound, Aki woke up and witnessed the scene at their front door.

As he saw the two ready to go, he slightly regretted his past self’s suggestion.

What was I thinking? Aki thought to himself.

He only suggested going to the bar because there was a guy there that he found alluring, but never worked up the courage to speak to him. Maybe if these two were in tow, they could be his wingmen, or rather, wingwoman and wingman, but maybe they might make things worse. Aki had never been one to be irrational.

“C’mon, let’s go,” Denji said as he saw Aki slowly get up from the couch.

Denji and Power bounded out the door, Aki a few steps behind as they walked out to the busier main roads of Tokyo. It was only September, but the sun had already set, and the streetlights were on to light their path.

Aki, get a grip and pull yourself together.

About five minutes later, they were at the bar Aki promised to take them to. It was a Thursday night so it wasn’t busy.

“IDs please,” the bouncer huffed at the door.

The trio handed over their IDs and the bouncer glanced at Aki and Power’s, waving them through, but held on to Denji’s.

“This really you, son?”

“Yes, Denji Hayakawa,” he replied, grinning ear-to-ear.

“You adopted?”

“Urm, sorta… it’s a long story.” His voice trailed off as he panicked about getting stopped at the door.

With another look down at his ID and back up at Denji, the bouncer waved him through too.

Aki already had a Red Eye in his hand and Power was starting to chug down a highball, determined to win her bet she made earlier with Denji that she could outdrink him that night.

“What can I getcha, son?” the bartender said as he approached Denji from the other side of the bar.

“I’ll have uh… be- hold on, give me a minute.”

Maybe beer isn’t a good idea, Denji thought, remembering what happened a few years ago at a college after-party, and shuddered. Oh, shoot, why didn’t I think about what I wanted before? I have been looking forward to this day.

“A Chuhai will do,” he finally replied. That’s what he saw people drink on TV that one time. No one in the show grimaced so it can’t be that bad, right?

The bartender cracked open the can of fruity alcohol and passed it over to Denji.

“Do you want to open a tab?”

“A what?”

“A tab.”

Aki heard some commotion behind him and walked over to Denji. He looked at the bartender and said, “You can put it under Hayakawa.”

“Thank you, sir,” the bartender replied and bowed.

After Denji got his drink, Aki led him over to their table where Power was and slid down to his seat.

“That highball hit the spot! I’m going to get another one!”

Before Aki could get a word in, Power was already heading towards the bar. In a few minutes, she came back with two highballs.

“Power, maybe we should–”

“Shut the hell up, Topknot,” she interrupted.

Aki felt himself tense up. Sighing, he excused himself to the bathroom

This was probably a terrible idea but you have to relax.

Aki was so lost in thought that he almost knocked over the person coming out of the bathroom.

“Sorry, excuse me,” said the voice.

It’s him.

Aki’s heart was now practically pounding out of his chest. Not only was he flustered over the fact that he thought he could bring Denji here for his birthday as a guise to ask out a guy he’d seen play here, but he physically bumped into him.

Aki was speechless but it didn’t matter. He turned and saw that the other male was already halfway down the hallway that led to the venue’s backstage area.

He sighed as he walked into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face.

It was a good thing he got a pay raise recently, or he would be in trouble because, by the time he came back from the bathroom, Denji was wolfing down a hamburger while Power pulled all the vegetables out of hers.

“Ugh, after I told them only meat in the burger and they still gave me vegetables,” Power said angrily.

“Hope you don’t mind that we put this on the tab too,” Denji said, as he helped himself to the food Power was putting down on her plate.

“No, go ahead, it’s your birthday,” Aki replied dryly. He went to the bar to get another drink.

The lights dimmed by the time Aki got back to the table and the man he came here to see walked onto the stage and seated himself on the piano bench.

He played the opening chords to the first song that night. His voice crooned as he sang the first verse.

This song, what was it called again? “Iris” by Goo Goo something, I think.

Aki was familiar with older music that were considered hits of their time. The administrative staff at the construction company he worked for allowed their employees to choose the music for the office. This was one of the ones they had on their rotating playlist.

His attraction to this man on stage, he could never put his finger as to why. Love at first sight was not something he believed in, but the way the spotlights illuminated this man kept his eyes glued to the stage. There was just something so familiar about this man.

He was nervous and sweating bullets as the performance continued. To try and clear his thoughts, Aki downed his drink in one gulp but it didn’t help. Instead, another headache came onto him. He didn’t fight the stabbing pain this time.

It’s going to be two today, huh?

The view was an ocean in front of him. He was able to move his head this time and saw that his left, a sleeve was slapping against the wind into the torso, devoid of where an arm should be.

He looked down. The body was dressed in a suit.

I don’t know who this person is or what these visions are showing, but this can’t be me. Why would I ever wear a suit? I oversee a crew in construction.

Aki couldn’t figure out what triggered the headaches and visions. They just came, drowning out his environment every time. The only connection he made was that these visions had been occurring ever since this bar opened up but it could just be a coincidence at best.

“Hayakawa, this is an order. Say you’ll make a contract.”

A woman’s voice.

“Aki, don’t,” a voice next to him gasped.

He couldn’t turn to see, still looking down at the body he was in, but the voice sounded familiar.

“I’ll make a contract.”

That voice, he was speaking. At least it sounded like him. But why was he making a contract?

Aki saw the body that he assumed was next to him lunge forward. A small frame with a head of auburn hair.

Before long, chains were coming towards him. Or were they coming out of him? He couldn’t control this body he was in. And then, everything went back. One more sharp stabbing sensation to his head broke the vision and everything faded back to him sitting at the table with Denji and Power.

The song being played on stage nears its end.

The last note was suspended in the air as other patrons in the room clapped. The man sat at the piano, took a deep breath, and played another song. Aki tried to pick up what the song was, but the aftereffects of the headache were too much and his thoughts were interrupted.

“Pssst, Topknot, I thought we were at a club. What is all this posh stuff?” Power gestured at the atmosphere around them.

“I never said we were clubbing. I only promised to take you guys to a bar and we are at one,” Aki replied.

“Iwannagoclubbingggggg,” Denji drawled.

“Yeah, take us clubbing!” Power demanded.

Aki shushed her.

“Power, Denji is drunk beyond comprehension,” he pointed out. “Take him home since you two don’t want to be here.”

“Noooo, I’m totalllyyyy okay,” Denji slurred out.

“Does that make me the winner of our drinking contest?“ Power asked, beaming in delight.

Giving up, Aki gave her a half-hearted “yeah.” He didn’t have the energy to take care of a skull-splitting headache and these two simultaneously.

Power pumped her fists in the air.

“You hear that Denji? I won. From here on out, I declare that you have to eat my vegetables for the rest of your life.”

Denji only moaned from the stomach pain he was feeling.

“Take him home,” Aki repeated.

Without any more objections, Power and Aki grabbed Denji under one arm each, helping him to his feet. Denji was a bit wobbly at first but eventually found his footing. Feeling confident that Denji was indeed fine, he saw the two off at the door and returned to their table, sitting all by his lonesome as he nursed his empty cup.

The man’s set was winding down and Aki knew he didn’t have much time left. Why was he still here if he was going to go home and mope afterward? If he was going to act, it was now or never. But the vision he had occupied his thoughts. It wasn’t until someone behind him said “hey” did he realized he had lost track of what was going on.

It was him. The guy that he couldn’t stop thinking about, the guy who he felt like he needed to reach out to, to connect with, but couldn’t, the guy that…

“The bar’s closing soon. You have to leave,” he said in a monotone voice.

“Oh, I’m s-sorry,” Aki stammered.

“I don’t make the rules,” the other male shrugged as he began to head towards out the door.

Stop being a coward. Go talk to him.

“Hey!”

He did it. He initiated the conversation.

To his surprise, the person he felt like he had been chasing for a lifetime stopped.

“Angel, was it?” he asked sheepishly. “The name’s Hayakawa. Aki Hayakawa.”

He extended his hand out and Angel shook it.

“A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Hayakawa,” he replied formally.

“You can drop the Mr. In fact, you can call me Aki,” he blurted out.

The other man only looked at him. Feeling like he had to fill in the silence, Aki continued.

“I was going to ask….”

What was I going to ask?

“Hey, you kids need to leave!” the bartender shouted across the room.

“Sorry,” Aki apologized profusely.

“You wanna chat outside?” Angel offered.

“Uh, yeah, sure.”

They headed to a nearby park and sat on opposite ends of a bench.

“I have something-” Aki began as Angel started to say, “I think–”

“You go first,” Aki offered.

“No, you go.”

There was another brief moment of silence.

“Okay, this is going to sound weird, but I think I have met you before somewhere. Like, not here, but also here. Sorry, this might all sound weird.”

“I was going to ask you something similar but I guess I don’t have to,” Angel chuckled.

Aki was left speechless as Angel continued.

“Do you not remember, Aki? It was 1997. The Gun Devil? Makima? They took everything away from us.”

“But we’re in 2022.”

“We’ve reincarnated,” Angel said with a smile. “You, me, Denji, and Power.”

Aki was too stunned to speak.

“What? No. That’s crazy!” he exclaimed. “Denji and Power, my parents adopted them, and then…”

And then what?

He didn’t remember what happened. One day, they were in Hokkaido, the next, in Tokyo to visit his biological grandparents, and have lived there since.

“You’ve had the visions too, right?”

“Yeah, wait, what–”

“Those visions, they’re our previous life.”

“But how do you know? Everything from those visions seemed so nonsensical.”

“Except they’re not, Aki. In our last life, we were known as Devil Hunters.”

Devil Hunters.

Aki groaned as he felt another stab of pain and grabbed his head. Now was not the time to have three headaches in one day, this one more painful than what he’d experienced all day.

“Aki! Aki!”

Aki could tell Angel was shouting, but they were muffled by the all-consuming darkness that started to cloud his senses.

“You are going to die in the worst way possible,” a voice mockingly chuckled behind Aki in his vision.

He could move this time and turned towards the voice. A single eye peered back at him in the darkness. Aki knew the name of this apparition.

Future Devil.

Upon seeing the devil, memories began to flood him. Working as a Devil Hunter in Public Safety, housing the two fiends, Himeno, his time with Angel, the assassination attempt on Denji, going to Hokkaido to his family grave one last time, the Gun Devil, his contract with Makima when she took everything from him, and lastly, realizing he became the thing he despised the most, being the Gun Fiend.

Aki found himself curled in the fetal position on the ground, gasping for air. Angel hovered over him, relieved that Aki was back.

“Hey, hey, you’re okay.”

Angel rubbed Aki’s back reassuringly.

Aki reached out and pulled Angel into a hug, tears streaming down his face.

“I- I’ve been working up the courage to talk to you all these weeks when you showed up,” he confessed.

Angel went in for the kiss. He can touch Aki now. Genuinely touch without fear of siphoning away people’s lifespans.

Aki returned the kiss passionately. His old partner, the person he began to warm up to decades again, he can finally kiss him. It was everything he had fantasized about and more.

Breaking away, Aki asked the most concerning question.

“Why are Denji and Power here? They’re fiends. They should still be alive back then.”

“Power was killed by Makima shortly after you turned. And the Denji you know in this lifetime, that one died as a human. The fiend Denji you know is probably out there somewhere.”

“And how did you know what happened? You died that same day as me.”

“Hey, a devil, I guess ex-devil, can have his secrets too,” Angel said smugly.

Aki was too shocked by all these revelations but there was one more thing he had to know.

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner? You saw that I frequented the bar. Looking back now, probably too frequently.”

“I admit, I was hesitant. I didn’t want to scare you away. Also, I didn’t know where you lived and you always left the bar before I was done playing so I couldn’t talk to you after,” Angel said with a laugh.

“You’ll never scare me away,” Aki said as he planted kisses from Angel’s forehead down to his mouth.

“I know, but I had to be sure,” Angel replied between kisses.

They continued talking into the early morning, about what they had been up to in this new life, how much society had advanced, the eradication of devils in the world, and now how they could go on and lead normal civilian lives.

“I’m famished,” Angel said, stretching his arms. “The food at the bar got boring and I haven’t had anything for I don’t know how long. I could use some soft-serve ice cream right about now.”

Aki was about to object that ice cream wasn’t an appropriate choice for breakfast, but then he remembered and smiled, following Angel as they headed out onto the bustling streets in search of an ice cream truck.