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There is no big ceremony. No aching gasps of air taken into deflated lungs, no hands reaching out to beat against the wood encasing a body, none of the movie cliches of being resurrected. Goro Akechi simply dies and then he lives. It’s like waking up from a long dream, one his body remembers, well sort of.
It’s not really his body, at least not as he’s grown to know it, to hide it and exist in it.
In the dim light of a Kichijoji bathroom, he stares at a spot on his chest. Shirt unbuttoned to the middle of his ribs. Stares at the smooth expanse of skin where a gunshot wound should be, feels across his back for its exit wound and feels nothing, nothing besides his own cold unblemished skin beneath his fingers. He breathes deeply a few times and wonders about the state of his lungs, if they mirror the unmarred and perfect planes of his skin, if the two years worth of his nasty cigarette habit disappeared when whatever brought him back decided to put him back together with new and shiny parts.
He glares in annoyance at the pristine condition of his fingers, gloves discarded on the sink in front of him. His nail beds are perfectly maintained, untouched by his other equally nasty habit of chewing his nails to the skin in the relative seclusion of his small apartment. His hands are clean, soft, and unbloodied. Free of the callouses he’d built up from fighting through mementos on his own, from holding a sword, a gun, other equally calloused hands.
His hands feel too soft against his skin, his foreign, unbruised and untouched skin. Goro looks like he was born only earlier that day, flushed pink with new life and fervor, in a body he has no idea how to call his own. That feeling is, ironically, familiar.
His hands don't shake as he unbuttons his shirt the rest of the way, as the winter chill rests on the skin he reveals to it, his hands don't shake and neither does he as he stares in the mirror at a chest he’s only ever dreamed of having.
He’s skinny, ribs protruding slightly as he turns this way and that, watching the planes of his chest catch on jagged shadows instead of curved ones. There is nothing soft about him, there are no pink indents of recently removed bindings along his skin, because there is no longer anything to bind. He plants his hand firmly against his newly flat chest, feeling his heart pound beneath this new skin. He wonders about his heart, what it looks like, untouched by a tearing bullet, pumping hard and fast, keeping him alive. Is it his heart? Is it his body?
In the dingy light of the Jazz Jin bathroom, he stares at his changed reflection and thinks of the Ship of Theseus, of these fundamental changes. He finds he recognizes himself. As he always has, regardless of the shape of his body, of the biology that makes shapes. It feels like nothing new, even though that's all it is.
Goro ponders the philosophical question only a bit more, growing aware of the fact that he can't just stay in this bathroom staring at himself. He buttons his shirt, smooths his hand down the planes of his chest, watches the way his shirt sits across it and as he begins to tuck the ends into his pants he nearly breaks into laughter.
He puffs air out harshly from his nose as he tries to contain himself, as he reaches down to crassly cup himself through his pants, as he’s seen so many ill mannered boys do in school hallways and general public. It's a strange sensation, as strange as it was to feel up his chest or rather lack of, it makes him a bit giddy, in a way he isn't sure he’d ever admit, but lets the feeling sit in between his ribs as he continues to redress.
Once dressed he glances one last time at the mirror, and he looks back. Despite everything. It’s him .
--
The tone of Leblanc's bell seems to be the last normal thing that remains in the building. Goro schools his face as he smiles at the cheery face of Wakaba Isshiki, as he pretends not to know what she looks like as her form dissipates into black smoke, ignoring the dark cloud that's hung around him and the Sakura’s since he’d killed her.
He only spends a moment watching the silly human form Morgana had seemingly taken, deciding he really doesn't have time for that. Instead he focuses on Akira.
Akira and the stupid look he has on his face as he stares back at him.
For a moment he wonders if he can tell. If he can see through the layers of his coat and his naked form, if he knows he’s changed. Akira looks too shocked to come to a good conclusion, so he brushes his thoughts aside and beckons Akira outside. Goro tries not to smile as Akira nearly trips over himself to do so, as the door closes he thinks he hears Sojiro chuckling about “ honeymooners ,” he ignores it.
“Well, let's try to assess the situation,” he says, purposefully blase, partly because he knows it'll piss Akira off and that amuses him, partly because he's trying to convince himself being in Akira’s presence again, with all that's changed, is totally normal and not strange at all.
Akira is breathing heavily through his mouth, air frosting as it leaves him, disappearing around his pinking cheeks and nose. His eyes dart up and down Goro’s body, searching, trying to understand what’s in front of him, what Goro has thrown at his feet like a well meaning cat.
“Are you-?” Akira reaches a trembling hand towards him but only gets about halfway before sharply pulling it back to his side. Goro feels the lack of his touch like a slap, tilts his head in a nasty sneer as he looks at Akira, whose breath stutters in his throat at the sight.
“What? Real?” Goro spits, “As real as ever. Well, probably about as real as Wakaba is, if there's any sense to this situation.”
Akira seems to take in his words for a second, eyes wide and disbelieving, until he seems to shake himself out of it, something in his words pulling him from his stupor and into action. Goro holds back a gasp as Akira blows caution to the wind and all but pounces on him, crowds him against the dryers and kisses him like a man dying.
Goro nearly chuckles at that, he was once a man dying after all, he thinks he would've kissed Akira this way too, if he had been given the chance in that boiler room.
Akira’s hands are cold where they cup his cheeks, they're as rough as he remembers, as he adores. Proof of his hard working nature, of his wins, his losses, of his life. Goro nearly groans at the realization that Akira is unchanged, that his body most likely still carries all its well earned marks, he gasps into Akira’s blisteringly hot mouth as he thinks of the marks Goro had once left on him, of shallow cuts earned during mementos spars, he hopes they scarred, that even if he’d never returned, never woken up bleary and alone at their usual table at the Jazz Jin, Akira would house him. He’d have no other choice.
“How?” Akira pants into his mouth and Goro answers by biting on his lip, smiling at the hiss of pain and nearly delirious giggle that rips from Akira’s throat. “It’s really you,” the words are breathy and taste the way Akira always does, coffee and warmth and entirely addicting. “Still so mean,” he chuckles against Goro’s cheeks, where he plasterers open mouthed kisses.
Akechi laughs at that, rough and kiss drunk. “Whatever brought me back, let me keep my stellar personality,” he says dryly, pulling Akira back to his mouth to kiss him again, a touch softer this time, savoring and teasing.
“Wouldn't want you any other way,” he mumbles against him, tongue licking against his teeth, as if trying to commit Goro’s taste to memory, or drink it all in lest he slips from his fingers again. The words draw him back to awareness of his body, of the way Akira grips his hips, the ways his hands wander and leave blazing trails in their wake. Heat pools in the pit of his stomach, sharper and different than what he’s felt before, overwhelming in unfamiliar and intoxicating ways.
His head spins as he pushes Akira away from him, as he squeezes his eyes shut and lays his head against his shoulder and breathes heavily. Above him Akira also tries to catch his breath, hands clutching to the fabric of Goro’s coat, so tense he worries momentarily of their tearing. He loses track of how much time passes, how long they breathe together before he feels Akira come back to himself, placing a soft barely there kiss at the crown of his head and then temple, slowly moving and kissing until their foreheads are leaned against each other.
Sappy idiot , he thinks and rolls his eyes when Akira smiles, as if he knows what he’s thinking.
“You’re back,” he whispers, awed and shaky. Goro hums, and that's not all , he goes to say but is interrupted by the soft tone of Akira’s phone ringing.
“Go ahead,” he whispers back, secretly revelling in the way Akira seems to find pulling away from him painful. Goro lets his head lean against Akira’s shoulder again, allows himself this moment, lets himself indulge in what he’s struggling to believe isn't a long dream, lets himself not worry about waking up. He breathes Akira in and listens to his own blood rush in his ears, wondering briefly what it looks like inside him, if he bleeds the same red, if he even bleeds at all.
On the phone Kasumi sounds as she always does, young and nervous, it makes him smile despite himself, it's another familiar piece to this incomprehensible puzzle.
Akira hangs up, Goro rights himself, catches Akira’s eyes. They say nothing for a few moments, drinking each other in, its Goro who looks away first, bumping shoulders as he passes him, positive that if he didnt Akira would be content to just stand there staring at him well into the night, idiot.
Akira chuckles behind him, like he knows. Goro fights against the warmth that settles in his chest whenever Akira does that, at the warmth of being known .
--
Infuriated is too calm a word to describe the rage in his body, the disgust and exasperation. Standing outside Maruki’s eyesore of a palace, missing Kasumi, Sumire , stinking of Maruki’s overwhelming ego and audacity.
“That was…” Akira starts and trails off, eyes dancing in his head as he tries to take in all the information presented to them.
“Fucking ridiculous?” Goro supplies, Akira makes a noncommittal noise and Goro’s blood boils . “Of all people? Your school counselor?” He bites out around a humorless laugh, he rounds on Akira, finger pointed at his chest, jabbing and accusatory. “And you bunch of stupid easily trusting morons gave him exactly what he needed! For months! Not a single one of you thought that was fucking weird?!” How the ridiculous Phantom Thieves evaded him for as long as they did begins to piss him off all over again, how they manage to tie their fucking shoes is becoming a mystery. He chances a glance down at Akira’s boots, huffs when he finds them neatly tied.
“Goro.” Akira says, fingers pinching the base of his nose, aggravation spilling off him in ways. It makes Goro’s mouth nearly water, want to sink his teeth into it, to poke and prod and make him angrier, to match him.
“Still, they’re all out there living this fake dream, accepting these falsehoods, your dear naive thieves,” he spits, voice dripping with venom, mouth curling on a smile.
“Quit it,” Akira states, pointed and hard, not rising to the bait, the challenge. Goro rolls his eyes. “Don't talk about them like that, I also…,” his gaze drops from Goro’s, he scoffs.
“Susceptible, like their leader,” he shakes his head and tsks. Akira rolls his eyes this time, before landing back on his face again. Auburn meets grey and Goro wants to kill him all over again. Akira looks like a kicked puppy, like a child who got nothing for christmas and birthday, or rather actually, like one who got everything he wanted before it was taken away and put on a high shelf.
Akira’s fingers twitch at his side, he looks at Goro like a man drowning, he ignores the catch in his own throat. Akira seems to contemplate many things in just a few seconds, Goro watches him compartmentalize, watches him focus and steel his nerves, right his shoulders. It makes something tight in his chest.
“Sumire,” he says, voice gritty with emotion, Goro nods.
“I’m the first to praise our combined powers, there's no way we're getting to her with just the two of us,” he states the obvious, hoping for it to rattle around in Akira’s head and stick, dislodging any ideas of living his friends to live in their ridiculous wonderlands. Akira gulps like he understands what he’s saying, Goro hates that it's proving to be such a difficult thing to swallow.
He won't accept it. This reality. This life. To be someone's puppet, someone's shiny new toy, put together with parts he’d enjoy to keep him more docile. He nearly growls at the memory of Maruki’s smile as he explained, as he preached his reasons to them.
“I have saved you such heartache,” Maruki said, voice soft as he addressed the three of them with vague words. “Why would you want to change anything? Why would you want to go back to what you were?” Goro pointedly ignored the way Maruki looked at him, ignored the memories of his near naked body in that bathroom, his reflection in every passing mirror, the feeling of being in this body. His body.
Maruki had continued his spiel, Goro relished in the fight, in the feel of his blade in his hand, the pure power that flows through his veins, the heady feeling of standing next to Akira and feeling his power brush against his. It's enough to keep him focused, but he can't ignore the knowing way Maruki looks at him, his gaze piercing right through him, into him. It pisses him off, to say the least.
I have saved you such heartache. He feels the phantom pain of a bullet pass through his chest, tear through his artery, through his back.
I have saved you such heartache. He hears whispers of Akira’s calls to him, hands uselessly pounding at thick metal, begging for him back.
I have saved you such heartache. He wants to trace his fingers across bruises on his ribs, breathe a deep ache as he unsticks the sports bandage from his skin.
“Fucking bastard,” he whispers, mostly to himself. Akira chuckles from where he stands, gazing at him wistfully. It makes Goro want to scream, to tear into him right in the middle of the street. He wonders if anyone would even care, if a passerby would pull him off Akira's bleeding body, or if they’d leave them be because it’s what he wants, and isn't that all that matters in this preposterous world.
He decides not to test it, decides he’s too exhausted to beat Akira bloody in the street, decides on a different way to make his point heard, to drive it into Akira’s overly empathetic head.
Goro turns, throws one last look over his shoulder to Akira, to the beaming trash heap of a palace, and signals with his head to follow. He doesn't look back to check if Akira does, he knows.
--
He hears the confused noise Akira makes when he walks past Leblanc’s and instead leads them into the bathhouse.
It's empty, he wonders if that's by chance, if chance even exists in this world where you can have anything. He locks the door behind them anyways.
“Goro?” Akira questions, but follows him deeper, past the showers and into the baths. The steam feels good on his winter chilled skin, he sighs at the feeling, closing his eyes momentarily to the sensation. Not for the first time since this massive plot has been revealed, Goro tries to feel it as deeply as he can, trying to memorize small little sensations, wondering when the rug will be pulled from under him.
“Strip,” He says, cocking his head towards the bath. He smiles as Akira blushes, tries and fails to hide it beneath his scarf. He rolls his eyes, pops two buttons on his vest and waits for Akira to do the same.
“Not that I don't enjoy these turn of events but why-?”
“I have to show you something,” He cuts him off. “For you to understand, how much I wont accept this.”
“Oh Goro,” Akira breathes and he tries not to get so annoyed at the sympathy that bleeds in his voice. “I understand I do, it’s just…”
“Shut up, just do it.” He says, turning away from Akira and beginning to take his clothes off without more preamble. Behind him he hears Akira mutter under his breath and scramble for his clothes, it makes Goro smile a bit. As he finishes pushing his pants down he hears the sound of water sploshing as Akira steps into the bath, along with the resounding hiss of pleasure he makes from the temperature.
He isn't nervous as he turns around, he wonders if he should be. But he hadn't felt insecure about his body in a long time, refusing to give anyone that edge over him, his body was his own, his to mold, to grow, to change. His .
He smiles as the same stupid look Akira got from seeing him in Leblanc earlier graces his face again. As he takes Goro in, awed and confused, Goro smiles, like a blood sniffing shark and steps in the water.
“Wha-?” Akira starts, blushing to his ears as Akechi moves slowly through the water, smirking softly at the way Akira’s eyes fall all over him, his chest and stomach, between his legs and down his thighs, it makes him laugh softly.
Within reach, the water just barely below their chests, he extends a hand out to Akira. Who looks shocked and like his brain is rebooting, but places a warm, wet hand in Goro’s, the touch seems to knock him out of his shell shocked state, surprising Goro by gripping his wrist. Pulling his hand to his face, turning his wrist this way and that, inspecting his fingers.
“They're…” he mumbles, Goro taps his finger against Akira’s nose, smiling as it wrinkles beneath the touch.
“Untouched, yeah,” Goro replies, voice low, as if speaking to a spooked animal. “Maruki seems to have taken a lot of liberties with what I want.” He scoffs. Akira’s other hand rises slowly from the water, trembling slightly, inches from his bare chest, his eyes search his for permission, which he gives.
Akira’s touch lights a fire across his skin like it always has but he sucks in a breath at the feeling, intense and heated against him, Akira’s touch .
All the months he’d dreamed of his hands on his skin, on his body. Nights at Leblanc grazing elbows and touching knees, hesitant first kisses and touches, long discussions in between makeout sessions about boundaries and journey in self discovery, sweet shaking hands applying a bandage on the meat of of his thigh after his shot, followed by even sweeter kisses on top.
It’s like all of those moments all at once, pressed against his chest, his unbound, inarguably masculine chest. Euphoria is heady as it rushes through his veins, he swallows the gasp Akira gives as he throws his arms over his neck and presses against him, kissing him within an inch of his life, unable to help himself.
Akira moans something like his name into his mouth, laughs something giddy and over excited into his neck, holds him back just as hard and dearly as Goro holds onto him.
“Oh my god Goro,” he says softly, though with so much inflection he might as well have been shouting. “You-”
“A real boy now?” He says, can't help himself, the nasty words crawling out of him before he could stop himself, though he doubts he would if he had the chance. Akira doesn't miss a beat in the eye roll he gives him, the sharp squeeze at his waist and shake of his head.
“You’ve always been a real boy,” Akira says, easy, honest. Something unspools in Goro’s chest.
Goro nods at the words. “I know that,” He starts. “I’ve always known that. This bastard and his cheap tricks thinks this is all I’ve ever wanted, like giving me a dick and balls is going to keep me placated in this fabricated world.”
Akira snorts an ugly laugh at his crassness, it makes Goro smile, Akira kisses him softly, before looking down at the steaming water.
“He gave you a nice dick too, master manipulator,” He comments and it's Goro’s turn to laugh. They share in silence for a few moments, watching each other, Akira with an unrestrained joy for him, Goro waiting for it to pass.
Akira traces a thumb against the muscle of his pec, softly, barely a whisper. Goro remembers those fingers on the swell of his breasts, the feeling of it, the arousal and coupled trust between them that made his head dizzy, that made his heart swell, that made pulling the trigger that much harder. The physical feeling is slightly different, he can't decide which one he prefers.
“You know this doesn't change anything? Between us I mean,” Akira says, moving to place a kiss beneath his collarbone, a practiced action.
He sighs, letting Akira kiss to his heart's content. “It does, in a different way,” He starts, shivers when Akira hums against his heated skin to show he’s listening, letting him talk. “I mean I know this doesn't change anything between the two of us, we’d end up in this situation whether I had this body originally or not but that's not what matters,”
Akira kisses up his neck, grips him closer, sits him directly on his lap, Goro grips at his shoulders.
“None of it matters,” He says into Akira’s hair, smiling when Akira grumbles in disagreement. “Because I'm not supposed to be here, in the first place, Akira.” Akira goes still beneath him, no doubt remembering the event that's supposed to make that so.
“I died there, I’m supposed to be dead. He altered me, my wishes, to no doubt make me more complacent, to lure you into this fantasy, to live in it with me,” Goro continues, as Akira shakes in his arms.
“You can't tell me it doesn't feel-” Akira starts suddenly, head raising to look him in the eyes. His grey eyes watery and wide, Goro sighs.
“Good? Right?” He finishes for him. “It feels good, of course but it also doesn't feel right, not completely. Not knowing where it’s all from, not knowing what it costs.”
He lets the words rest between them, skim across the edges of the water and dissipate into steam.
Akira rests his head in the middle of his chest, above where a gunshot wound should be, he feels the words against his skin more than he hears them.
“You’d get to keep this” Akira isnt talking about his life.
“This isn't how I want to live,” Goro is talking about his life.
Akira sighs, heavy and pained, kisses above his heart before sitting up, leaning his forehead against his.
“I missed you,” he admits, words aching and nearly desperate. “I missed you so much, how can you ask me to give you up?” His words trail off in a whisper, inciting the previous anger inspired by Maruki’s revelation in his heart.
He grips at Akira’s jaw, turning his face to meet his eyes, his other hand clenches at the base of his throat, squeezes enough to make Akira gasp and squirm, Goro keeps the pressure firm, lets his anger burn through him as he speaks.
“Because I will hate you, if you don't,” he spits. “My fate is my own, mine. No one will ever pull my strings again, not even you.”
Akira’s eyes are wide, face pink and blotchy, Goro smiles when Akira nods, releasing his hold on his throat, laughing as he sputters for air.
“Mean,” Akira says through a gasp but smirking, crooked and all teeth.
“Always,” He replies against his lips, kissing him deeply, keeping him from catching his breath and only getting his air from the pants and moans Goro spills into his mouth.
They kiss until their skin starts to prune, until the water grows cold and Akira has deemed Goro’s body thoroughly and properly explored.
—
In the dark of Akira’s room, lit up only by streams of pale moonlight, Akira gazes down at him, propped against his elbow, stroking his cheek softly every once in a while.
“You should go to bed, busy day tomorrow,” Goro admonishes, without much heat in his voice. Akira laughs softly, shrugs.
“It's hard to sleep without Morgana and besides, I like looking at you,” The words are heavy, loaded, Goro squirms beneath the weight of them.
“How disgustingly romantic really, I could throw up,” he monotones back, which Akira laughs at heartily.
They fall silent, he listens to the way Akira breathes, pretends to fall asleep to avoid the obvious way Akira wants to ask him something. Akira knows him too well though, it annoys him just as deeply as it always did.
“Goro.”
“Hmm.”
“Is there anything, anyone, that would've changed your mind?” Akira asks slowly, as if afraid Goro would snap and bite him for his question. Which he would, but he’s much too tired now.
Goro thinks about it, thinks of his good for nothing father rotting in prison, tries to imagine what his mother would look like with grey hairs and crows feet pulling at her eyes, the soft tone in which she would say his name, the color of the house they would have.
He thinks of long fingers across a chess board, tastes sweet coffee kisses in his mouth, thinks of toppling over a king piece with a queen, smiling as he calls checkmate, as the pieces are rearranged and never tiring of the way grey eyes meet his.
He aches . He wants. Life floods through his veins, pumps through his heart, a sick promise of all he could have.
I have saved you such heartache. Maruki’s words ring in his head.
He shakes his head.
“No there isn't.” He responds. Akira breathes and plants a kiss to his forehead as if to say “I know.”
Because who is he without heartache? And besides, what's a little more?