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It’s a cold night.
Takumi is asleep, and in his place, Eito has managed to leave his room and step out onto the roof. It’s a lot of effort, but there was this strange twisting in his chest that left him no choice. For once, he’s stepped out to look at the stars- pointedly avoiding the fake moon, an artificial satellite that clogs up the night sky.
Despite usually wandering into bed in his full sweater and jacket, a cold breeze is enough to ruffle Takumi’s hair, send a shiver down his spine. How his now forever-companion is still asleep is a mystery, but so is everything else about this strange arrangement.
(Sometimes, when Takumi’s awake, Eito is too, and he gets to see through his eyes and see his friends as they’re supposed to appear. Other times it’s awkward flesh and bone tearing through limbs and the usual awful sounds. Other times he’s asleep and he dreams of everything- flesh and bone itself, being inside an artery, a clear, empty field lit by a pale blue moon.)
Despite his current control, he feels no urge to do anything destructive. On another night he might grab the knife and slit someone’s throat; Hiruko, maybe? But that would be too obvious; Nozomi would destroy him, and he wants to see the suffering slow and steady. No, to simply kill someone at this stage would be too much of a jump from he wants now. Takumi’s deprived him of enough fun.
Either way, he has no impetus, so it’s a lost thing. The funny thing about moving the body is how much of it is instinctual, and how much of that instinct is not passed onto the ghost living in his blood.
“...Eito?”
Ah, he’s finally awake. Their eyes blink a few times, stuttering, confused by being outside with wide eyes. A jolt passes through, one that bothers Eito more than it bothers his host, who merely looks around before curling both hands around his midsection.
“What are you doing out here? Don’t tell me...”
“What, worried I killed someone? Hm, but you’ve already done that before, haven’t you, Takumi?”
Takumi says nothing in response, but Eito can feel the twisting in his gut like it’s his own. (Maybe it is, now.)
“Who do you think it was? I bet you want it to be someone you can accept, like, hm...Moko, maybe? After all, you’ve already killed two of her friends- what’s one more?”
“Eito.”
Eito sighs a little, shoulders deflating. Takumi’s mimic him, though he doesn’t seem surprised; if anything, expectant. A little boring, he thinks, and simultaneously infuriating and intriguing all at once. Takumi does not know him because he has not the mind to observe like Eito does- but, he supposes, he’s not a complete idiot. Enough time and maybe he can pick up on the little things.
Something squirms in him at that, so he finally drops the charade in hopes of soothing it. “But, sadly, no. I didn’t have the energy for that.”
“...You wanted to see the stars?”
“Huh?”
Conscious of his own insanity for once, Takumi is barely whispering. It’s obviously audible to the man that lives in him, now, but anyone else would assume he’s muttering prayers for good luck or affirmations to himself. They’d speak first, in any case, asking what’s the matter, and for once their goals align: neither of them want to be caught in this arrangement. That would spell both their deaths, and Eito hasn’t had his fun yet.
But even so, this whisper is careful. Reverent, almost- no, were it reverent, it would have more force behind it. Exploratory, then, someone who has seen something for the very first time and is in awe of its presence. The very idea makes him sick, and it makes him want to curl into a ball and swath himself in blankets, makes him want to strike and lash out at anything he can.
The best he can do is ball Takumi’s hand into a fist, which he hopes gets the sentiment across. Sadly, the world’s sleepiest leader has been interrupted in his precious nap time, and is particularly unobservant as a result.
“...You like them?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The stars. I don’t really get it, but...Karua talked about them a lot.”
If Eito is honest- fully honest, which he only ever is with himself- he does.
They’re beautiful, in their own way. Each brightens the night sky with the fervor only flames can reach, spanning across the galaxy. They make themselves known, and had they wills, could act upon them without discretion. He’d love to live among them, even for the last few minutes of his life as he dies a quiet death, because nothing can hurt in the void of space.
They sap his anger away like few other things can. As much as he needs it, it’s overwhelming at times; the reprieve is a calm he rarely truly embodies.
“But if you like them...we can watch them for a bit.”
Takumi’s breath hitches; belatedly Eito realizes it’s not his. The stars begin to spin, turning into blurry streaks upon the night sky. Warmth spreads in his chest that he doesn’t recognize.
“...Eito? Was that...too much?”
“Too much?” Eito scoffs. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t even know why you suggested that,” he spits, as though the venom in his tone isn’t an obvious facade. “What is this, some attempt to make me cave through kindness? I’m here forever, Takumi. You can’t get rid of me.”
“I wasn’t trying to.” Despite the quiet, despite the cold night air, despite the late hour and his penchant for sleeping the day away in a haze-
Takumi’s tone is solid. Genuine and driven both, in the way only a single-minded sort of guy can manage. Eito’s never known that sort of passion, because his is in a million parts that all converge into one. But there’s hardly any space in Takumi’s head for his heart, so the remainder can really only take up one cause.
Apparently, this is it.
(The alternative is that his heart is the one speaking now, and that is unfathomable, so Eito does not even consider it.)
“Then what? What is this?”
“...You’re stuck in my body,” Takumi points out. “You don’t have one of your own. You can’t do anything you wanted to, and you can only occasionally move my arm or stop me in place.”
“Humiliating me, then. There’s no need for that, Takumi. I promise I’m plenty entertained by watching you flounder about every day.”
Neither really rises to the obvious bait. “I can’t imagine it’s easy for you. I doubt it ever was. But either way, I...I don’t want you to be miserable forever.”
“You don’t want me to be miserable forever,” Eito repeats. “How kind of you.”
“Would you believe me if I said anything more?”
“You’d be lying if you did, so why would I bother?”
Takumi laughs.
Genuinely laughs, from the bottom of his lungs. Eito can feel it long before he finally hears it, and it’s...almost unremarkable. The sort of laugh you’d expect from a guy so plainly average, whose best skills are the movie quotes he can recite and falling asleep on a dime. It’s a little throaty, no deeper than his speaking voice.
It’s real. Undeniably, unequivocally, unfathomably real.
“...You’re crueler than you pretend to be,” Eito mutters, all the fight in him gone. He hopes Takumi figures out that they should go back to his room already, because there’s no energy left in him to guide them back there. Unfortunately, his life’s goal to mess with Takumi seems to have rubbed off on the inverse, because they still stand there, watching the sky.
It is, despite everything, still calming. Serene, in that these stars have no need for their squabbling, and will continue to live and die ad infinitum no matter the outcome of this war. Even if it takes humanity another million years to go extinct, or they do it right now, these stars will be here; maybe new ones, maybe the same burning cores watching from afar in memory, but stars nonetheless.
Small, maybe, is how he’d describe himself looking out at them. In his righteousness there is an implicit duty on his shoulders, but the stars seem to take it from him. If they’ll be watching long past, then it doesn’t really matter if he fails here; humanity will fall eventually, and the stars will be there to see it.
But the planets they tear asunder won’t.
“...You don’t have to, but...if we’re going to be stuck together, then can I ask you do to something for me?”
“Why should I?”
“Like I said, we’re stuck together. And I think...you’d enjoy it, too.”
“...What is it?”
As much as he abhors to be playing backfoot, he’s got no choice. Takumi’s done the equivalent of taking him by the hands and whirling him onto a ballroom floor, and he’s never learned how to waltz- who needs to anymore? But of course it’s sentimental, and Takumi, a sentimental sort of person, knows the steps perfectly no matter how much he protests.
“You don’t have to be kind. You don’t even have to stop trying to torment me. But...try to be kind to yourself, okay?”
Eito falls silent. Quiet seems to span into infinity; in his mind’s eye (which seems more real than reality nowadays), he feels like he’s the one standing on that empty field, and Takumi is the pale moon. Lonely as ever, with only the guiding light of a reflection to save him.
Takumi yawns. “I really am tired, though. Sorry to cut you off, but I’m going back to bed.”
Eito doesn’t stop him. He has no power to. Not when he feels so small he might be a bug in the grass, a little ant- smaller, maybe, even a pillbug. One that curls up when touched. Like that he can do no harm, and the rage can only fester, and that’s all anyone ever wanted.
For once, he goes to sleep when Takumi does. Something compels him to- this bone-deep fatigue he shouldn’t be able to feel, because he doesn’t have those anymore.
He sleeps, restfully so.
---
Now, in fairness, he has no good reason to be freaking out.
This is what he wanted. What he said he wanted. He wanted Eito dead, and killed him, and this whole sharing-a-body thing is just a consequence of that action. Really, the ideal was that Eito disappeared after being killed, and that was that.
But it’s been three days since that night on the rooftop, and he’s worried.
No more whispers in his ear when he’s talking to Nozomi. No more awkward twitches of his hand to make him seem a little nuts in front of his friends. No more pinches on his wrist when he’s not expecting them, no more waking up in the middle of the night to find he’s “sleepwalking again.”
Only his reflection gives him any hope that Eito’s still there- the reflection still has glasses and pale hair and sunken-in eyes.
But it’s less and less reassuring by the day. What if Eito’s changes to his cognition stayed, but he didn’t? What if Eito’s gone and he’s only left with an avoidance to reflections that even Sirei scratches his head at?
On the first two days, he told himself he was worried solely because it could mean trouble. That Eito was resting to become more powerful, perhaps, and take him over entirely. That it was some charade, and he was trying to get Takumi vulnerable enough to slip the reins into his own hands.
By the third day he had to admit the truth to himself: if a bit of kindness is all it took Eito to let go of that intense, passionate hate of humanity, then wasn’t he the villain of this story? He’s the one who can loop back in time; shouldn’t he have tried that? Even if it failed, after all, he could try again; that’s his blessing and curse. What if all it took was a genuine attempt to get to know him, to move through that initial fear and disgust and truly put his heart in his hands?
By the fouth, someone finally notices what’s wrong with him- kind of, anyway. “Hey...Takumi? Can we talk?”
“Nozomi? Uh, sure. Right now, or...?”
“Now is fine,” she insists lightly. The cafeteria is admittedly sparse- he’d been late to rise today, taking his time with a shower and putting on his shirt backwards three times in a row- with just the twins and the two of them. “Is...everything okay?”
“Huh?”
“I mean, it seemed like you sorted everything out after Eito died for a while, but...you’ve been down recently, haven’t you?”
“...Yeah,” he admits. It’s hard to keep anything from her- no matter how he looks at it, he sees Karua staring back at him, eyes piercingly clear as she tells him exactly what he feels. As though she’d always known, as though his mind had made her up just to talk to him, to know him. “I’ve just... been thinking,” he says, as though that’s an answer.
But she nods, compassionate as always. Guilt sometimes rises when he sees that smile, because he knows- he knows he’s killed two of her friends with his own decisions, knows there’s blood on his hands. Darumi, too, even if the two never met. “I get that. We’ve been through a lot.”
“Yeah,” he agrees.
Habit kicks in and he stays quiet, expecting a snarky response, or just the mild amusement emanating from the space above his left shoulder. Like someone’s leaning over him that isn’t there, their chin daintily resting on his jacket, their hair just barely-
“If there’s ever anything I can do,” Nozomi declares, “Just let me know, okay? You don’t have to take this burden alone.”
“...Thanks, Nozomi.” It really does strike him sometimes, how close the two are. “Though, I don’t want to burden you. I know it’s hard on you, too.”
“It’s hard on all of us,” she insists, but she knows what he means. “I mean, of course I miss them. It felt like...it felt like they were just a part of the world I was living in, you know? And then they weren’t.”
It startles him, how forcefully he realizes this all at once, but: he misses Eito.
He can’t help but nod, strung along easily, as she continues. “I woke up here, after...everything, and they were just there. They accepted me without question, brought me into the group with them, didn’t even mind that I couldn’t use my hemoanima. It felt like...it felt like somewhere completely new,” she admits.
“And then you saved us from that commander attack, and I guess it just felt like...like I couldn’t imagine them dying after that. After everything both we and you went through. You had to sacrifice someone at this campus, but you still saved us. How else could we repay you-repay her- but to live?”
If Eito were here, he’d capitalize on this. Mutter in Takumi’s ear about how pointless of a decision that was, because they’re already dead anyway, so what was the point? A few more- shouldn’t he have prioritized the main school, if he cares that much about humanity? Was that league of fighters really that important?
But he isn’t. He says nothing. That builds the guilt more than his words could at this point.
“...But none of us had a choice. Only if we were stronger, then...”
“Not to interrupt you two having a wonderful time over there,” Ima whole-heartedly interrupts with a signature grin, “But perhaps you should go back to bed, Mr. Sumino?”
"Huh?”
“You’re swaying...” Kako notes from beside him. Even when they’re fighting, somehow they’re nearly magnetically aligned, the habit too hard to break. “And you look really pale.”
“Do I? I feel fine...”
“Oh, no. Was that too much? I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No, no, you’re fine. I just-”
Takumi stands up too abruptly, and the world begins spinning. Nozomi’s instantly on him, a hand on his shoulder and another holding his head up to try and look in his eyes. “Takumi!”
“My, swooning for her now, are we? What a reversal of the status quo!”
“Brother Dearest, please. You’re embarrassing him even further...”
“I-I’m not embarrassed!”
Really, though, he’s not sure why he’s so light-headed. Until Nozomi gasps. “Your skin- it’s burning up!”
“Huh?”
“How embarrassing, Mr. Sumino! Getting so warm around a girl...”
“Wh- That’s not!-”
“Is this what typical high school love looks like?”
“Not you too!”
“...Maybe you should go get some sleep,” Nozomi offers. “I’ll walk you back to your room, okay?”
“I-I’ll be fine...”
“I’m sure you will, Mr. Sumino!”
By the time he wobbles out of the cafeteria, too shaky to get Nozomi to leave his side as he retreats back to his room, he wonders if he hates Eito or Ima more in the moment.
---
(The field is calm and soothingly cold. A gentle breeze runs through, and the grass is unexpectedly soft. It’s a nice dream, he thinks, watching the pale moon as it slowly wanes.)
---
“...mi? ....Tak.......Takumi? Hey, Takumi?”
“Mngh.....”
Takumi blearily opens his eyes to a concerned Nozomi. “Hey. You weren’t at breakfast, so I came in to check on you.”
“M’okay,” he insists, but his throat is dry. A glass of water is pressed into his shaky hand, which he drinks gratefully. Strangely, his limbs feel that sort of light-heavy after a battle, weak with exhaustion and beleaguered by the drowsy hour. “What time is it...?”
“A little past noon.” There’s an awkward smile on her face. “I would’ve gotten here sooner, but Hiruko held me up...”
Hiruko’s a strange name to hear, but he passes it by. Some relationships he’s privy to, some he isn’t; if they’ve made it a habit to speak it wouldn’t be particularly strange. Hiruko’s nicer to most of the girls at any rate, and he doesn’t doubt there’s plenty of respect there for Nozomi, who fights despite not having enough cryptoglobin in her blood.
"No worries,” he insists. “I just...think I’ll take it easy today.”
“Are you sure? Do you want me to get you anything?”
He waves a hand. “I’m fine, just tired...”
Nozomi huffs, but stands. “If you’re sure. I’ll come check on you tomorrow, okay?”
“If I don’t show up at breakfast,” he agrees easily. She smiles before leaving quietly. Idly, he wonders if she locked the door, but doesn’t bother getting up to check; without Eito, he doubts anyone’s going to come crawling under his bed anytime soon.
(Except maybe Yugamu- but frankly, he’s not sure a lock could stop that one.)
When she’s gone, though, the silence settles in like a cold snap. It hasn’t been quiet in so long- not with Eito around. Even if he’s not saying something or twisting his hearing, there’s an otherwise omnipresent thrum of his emotions that feels like a backing track, annoyance in times of unity and glee in times of terror. In a expedition, he once felt the rush of anger come to him like a demon possessed, and had to sheepishly insist he just got carried away once all the enemies fell to his blade alone.
Idly, he wondered if he could use any of Eito’s abilities, but mostly ignored it after. Even if he could, he’s not the kind to master them on a dime. He’d rather stick to his own.
Although in this state, he won’t even make it to the war room if there’s an attack.
“Eito?” He calls out to no one. He hasn’t tried this before, unwilling to make the discomfort known, but if his body is going through something he’d like some help with it. For all his unwillingness, they share one body, and must both take care of it if either wants to live.
And if he’s sure of nothing else, he’s sure Eito wants to live. His driving force is too great; there’s too much at stake for both of them.
Maybe he’ll think about it after a nap, Takumi decides. That’s for the best, anyway.
---
(There’s a tug on his brain, somewhere. Like someone’s calling for him. But it’s distant, and it sounds like home- and he’s never liked homes. They’re filled with people who don’t know what they look like. This is better. This is quiet. Peaceful. A good place to rest- and he deserves some rest, doesn’t he?)
---
Takumi gasps awake.
It’s still the middle of the night. His skin isn’t quite on fire, but it still burns him, and he’s shoving the covers off and taking off his shirt before he can really recognize what’s happening. The dream still surrounds him- Eito, smiling, that serene one he wore just once before he died in either timeline, not fake nor twisted with malice and soured by murder, standing at the edge of the roof, his hand slipping from the fence, the scrape of his shoes against the concrete as he-
His breathing comes out in hard pants. Pain twists his heart. Was that a warning?
On shaking knees and desperation he hauls himself over to the mirror.
It’s still Eito in the reflection. He catalogs the whole thing over and over- panting, fearful eyes, sweat dripping down his body, combing through every detail to make sure none of himself is pushing through the reflection. That might mean Eito is truly losing, and that would mean losing Eito, and within the span of maybe two days Takumi has gone from wishing he’d die to wishing he’d live a little harder.
Since he’s already in the bathroom, he decides on a cold shower. Whatever burns him from the inside out is determined, and unbearably so; maybe it’ll even wake up Eito, who will ask mockingly if there was something he needed to take care of. They’d go back to their old ways- Takumi will even ignore that night on the roof if it means he knows Eito is there again, squabbling in his ear, fighting to live.
Relief spreads through him instantly. His clothes are discarded by the shower door, and he knows he’ll need to deal with them eventually but everything goes out the window when he feels the soothing relief. Even after all the sweat and grime is gone, he sits under the shower, enjoying the water at its coldest.
Eito deserved to live. He knows that; he’s known that. That’s why he spared him in the first place. It was inevitable he’d betray them, but what else could he do? Eito is a human being, the same as the rest of them; is it his fault he was born seeing everyone else as monsters? If Takumi woke up tomorrow and everyone’s limbs were masses of flesh and their voices screaming nightmares, could he really keep himself together?
So he can’t blame Eito entirely. He’s lived with that his whole life; what is one to do but fall into that reality, at some point?
But, he wonders, can Eito now see the people around them as Takumi does?
Obviously Takumi inherited some of that condition through his cryptoglobin. But not all of it, because he looks at Nozomi and he sees her for who she is, can look at Kako or Gaku or Takemaru and see them normally. And Eito blatantly admitted he was manipulating Takumi’s perception, which means he should be able to see them normally.
Or is this problem not with his brain, biologically speaking? Is there something deeper to it- the “soul,” so to speak, Eito’s mind itself being unable to comprehend the human visage?
By the time he’s drying off, the fever hasn’t broken, but he feels a little better. Better equipped to ask Eito a thousand questions, and he thinks this time he’ll get an answer. Not because Eito will want to answer him- that’s a definite no- but because he won’t rest until he’s gotten his answers, or this fever truly boils him alive.
He lays down to sleep, determined more than ever.
---
“Eito,” a familiar voice calls.
The grass is warm. So very warm; he almost feels like he’s being baked alive in summer heat despite the night sky. It borders on uncomfortable, but the gentle grass and the familiar soft inside of his jacket keep him rooted to the spot. That, and the omnipresent moon, even as it wanes further.
“Hey, Eito.”
Less like words, and more like a distant call on the wind, he hears the voice. But it’s so jarring, and he’s finally comfortable; this is something he’s never known before. Why not let him rest a little longer?
“Eito!”
Suddenly, it’s in his ear, and he flinches.
“Takumi,” he responds automatically. His eyes don’t leave the moon, but he can feel someone next to him, standing near where he’s laying. There’s shuffling, even as he continues, “What, too lonely to leave me alone? Did everyone else push you away, finally?”
“No,” he answers easily. “Nozomi’s worried about you.”
Eito scoffs. As if such a lie would work. Instinctively his body turns, laying on his side- but his eyes can’t leave the moon, not with how it wanes so beautifully. Tragic, in a sense, but for some reason he feels it’s fighting its destiny. A curious thing; he has never been one to battle against the inevitable. Humanity will fall whether he will witness it or not; he simply wants to hurry it along.
“Does that mean everyone knows just how crazy you are? Maybe they finally see you for the disgusting creature I’ve always seen you as.”
“Always, huh?”
Takumi’s words are quiet again, but close to his ear. Belatedly, Eito realizes all the shuffling was him laying down next to him in the field. One of his hands must be outstretched toward him- but he doesn’t take it, mercifully, only laying there talking to him.
Acceptable, Eito surmises. If he’s going to die (he forgets when he accepted that, but now it seems obvious) he can have a little chat on the side.
“Always, Takumi.”
“Even now?”
“Especially now,” he murmurs. It sounds more like a song than it does a hissing snake. “You’re an ugly, filthy murderer. The same as every other human. You think anyone who’s different from you is wrong, label them defects, and wait for them to mess up, and then you kill them.”
“...I didn’t want to kill you.”
“You did,” he answers simply.
“You left me no choice.”
“Do you think I had one?”
“If you hadn’t attacked Sirei, and then sided with the commanders, and then attacked us, I-”
“And what would you know about any of that?” A familiar, simmering rage murmurs beneath his skin. It asks him to rise, to get angry, to leave this empty field; he doesn’t yet, because he has more to say. “Why do you act like you know me, Takumi? No one knows me. You can’t see what I see- the ugly, disgusting abominations that I have to endure looking at, smelling, even being in the same vicinity of. Even now, you have the same cognitive disorder I do, and you still can’t see it.”
“Eito-
“And now you have the gall to act like you know me? What, did the past version of me tell you he was lonely? I bet he didn’t. I bet he told you exactly how disgusting you all are, and you’re trying to act like that was just a mistake. Like I’d go back on my word with the power of friendship,” he spits. “But you’re all monsters. Even now, even in your head, you know I can’t see them like you do, right? They’re the same hideous monsters they’ve always been. Do you feel the revulsion like I do?”
“No,” Takumi admits, “...But you can see me, can’t you?”
“Huh?”
“You can see me like I see me,” he insists now, voice clear and solid. “You might not be able to see everyone else, but you’re in my head. You can see me.”
Silence stretches out between them. The breeze is cool; almost cold, now. He’d prefer the warmth of Takumi’s room, even as a facade, or maybe of reality, where he can quite nearly sit in his skin and watch from a distance. It’s not less disgusting, per say, but it is more tolerable when they’re a little detached.
“...You’re a little dopier than I imagined,” Eito pushes out.
“...Than you imagined?”
“Obviously I know that form isn’t what everyone else sees,” he mutters. “I can see anatomical models in textbooks just fine. I know what humans are supposed to look like- I just don’t see that. It’s not- it hasn’t been reality for anyone but myself.”
“Until now.”
“...Until now.”
“...Dopier, huh? I get that a lot.”
“Of course you do,” Eito mutters. Aside from laying down next to him, Takumi hasn’t encroached on his space in the slightest; a strange show of kindness from someone trying to kill him. But then, so is showing him the stars, and coming to find him here.
“Anything else?”
“Dumber,” is his instant answer, voice lilting into a mocking, “Oh, actually, I take that back. Even I could see how stupid you are.”
“...And?”
“And what?” The moon sits at its current spot- a perfect half, bisected by light and shadow, either side encroaching but never winning. Except the two halves of the moon do not fight; no, in the literature he likes, they are lovers, an eternal waltz spinning slowly enough to watch the phases go by. It’s the only show of human intellect that makes sense, to acknowledge that celestial bodies are more beautiful than any disgusting human could be. “Fishing for compliments? What, Nozomi hasn’t given you enough attention lately? Feels like it might be your fault?”
“I want to know what I look like,” Takumi says gently. He wonders, briefly, if his eyes are glued to the sky as well, or if there’s a pair boring into the side of his head. “I can’t look at myself in the mirror anymore, but you can look at me. So tell me what you see.”
Something snaps.
Eito looks at him- truly, entirely, looks at him.
Of course, the moment he woke up in Takumi’s mind he could see him. Their consciousnesses do take from each other; in this proximity it’d be impossible not to. Whatever’s stuck in his brain still translates all the humans into disgusting sacks of meat and terrible screeches accompany their words, but Takumi’s sense of self is strong enough that even he can’t miss it.
Red hair that falls a little messy around his face, an eternal bedhead he can’t brush out in the mornings no matter how much he tries. Fair skin, not pale like Darumi’s strange bone-tight flesh that seemed to wrap around her awkward form like meat preserved in plastic, but light enough to suggest he’s stayed in more than he should. Not quite a baby face, but enough plush to his cheeks to think he’s a little spoiled. Eyes often glazed over with hazy sleep, catching you off guard on the rare occasion they become piercingly driven.
(Those he could see, even before. Hence, his favorite: the only one with a feature he could stand.)
But if he tells the truth, the genuine, honest truth, and only to himself: none of this really changes his opinions on Takumi.
He has learned to live with his perception of the world, after all. He was not shocked to see his classmates of sorts sporting strange bone structures or gaping maws or the smell of rotting flesh. This is his life; he has learned to judge people by it, and by and large people do not surprise him. They are as cruel and awful as his innate repulsion suggests they should be.
But he is not an unreasonable person, and he has lived enough years to be open.
His repulsion is innate, yes. But so, too, is an innate fear of harmless bugs, or mud, or any other thing that nature hosts. To rely on his gut feeling to judge every individual is foolish, and would be succumbing to his base instincts, and then who would he be to judge humanity? He’d be no better than them, depraved and awful. So he vowed never to judge anyone solely by their species, because what if there was another of himself out there? They might see each other as monsters and pointlessly end each other.
So, this changes nothing, really. Takumi is who he has always been, as far as he’s known him- a bit sleepy, dedicated to his friends after he traveled through time to save them, a bit naive, and often guilty about choices he’s been forced to make.
(He’s not stupid. It’d be easy for Hiruko or Takemaru to claim he tried to escape and kill him for his hemoanima. Recently, he’s been glad it was Takumi- this was, perhaps, the only way for him to live.)
“The same as you always have."
“...You can’t mean that.”
“I do,” Eito says quietly. There is no point in lying here; what would he gain from that? Takumi is Takumi, and he doesn’t wish it any other way. If he could concede the reflection in the mirror to make that point he would.
Eito is many things. This he will admit, because it is obvious: lonely is one of them.
“You’ve always said you see me as an ugly human.”
“Because you are,” he says simply. “Ugly, imperfect thing. You rely on your base instincts to survive, and don’t think about the consequences. You don’t consider the bigger picture- all you want is a selfish, cruel eradication of all the people of this planet. That hasn’t changed.”
“...Then...”
“Your physical form doesn’t change who you are, Takumi,” Eito assures him. “I try not to judge people entirely based on their appearance, you know. That would be rude.”
“...And even so,” Takumi points out, “You’re still here.”
“...I am. What a poor decision on my part, huh?”
Takumi smiles. “No, I don’t think so. At least now I know you’re alive. You always will be, as long as I am.”
“And I’m the insane one?”
He laughs, gently enough to soothe whatever strange acid was already broiling in his throat. “Maybe you’re rubbing off on me too hard.”
“Maybe you’ll finally consider the depravity of humanity if I do,” Eito agrees.
Takumi sits up. Stretches his arms out like this isn’t a dream, and then offers a hand. “C’mon, then. Let’s play a new game.”
“A game?” Despite his incredulity, Eito sits up, too. Strangely, the field is no longer so inviting; it’s dead, almost, like a ghost of something that was once and can no longer be. “What, do you need the satisfaction of winning just as much as I do?”
“Who knows?” Takumi is smiling; for once, he gets to enjoy this view, no longer obscured by exposed arteries. “Here’s the rules: you try to convince me humanity deserves to die, and I convince you it’s worth trying to live.”
“And how is someone supposed to win this game?”
“By convincing the other,” Takumi insists.
It’s a stupid, pointless thing. He could have just let Eito lay here for the rest of his non-existence, silent and no longer irritating him. He could have taken a million different paths, but-
“Sure, why not? This one’s even easier on me than the last one.”
“I’ll be waiting to see what you come up with.”
---
Nozomi nearly claps her hands with excitement when Takumi wanders into the cafeteria. “There you are, Takumi! I was worried when I left you yesterday...”
“I told you I’d be fine, didn’t I?”
The rest of the group seems largely disinterested now that he’s wide awake and scarfing down his usual, the hunger of not eating a thing yesterday catching up with him. Idle conversation floats about the room, never quite pinning down one topic long enough to stay with it. Mercifully, Ima’s favorite target today is Gaku, who deserves enough of the rude comments that Takumi elects not to put himself in the spotlight.
And, of course, Eito, chiming in at random, picking apart their casual cruelty and worst qualities. On another day it might have been exhausting, the back-and-forth tiring enough that he’d consider conceding the points out of sheer exhaustion.
But today, he rises to the challenge with a renewed purpose. Unlike before, this game is perfectly suited for him. If neither does well, the game will continue forever, and Eito will stay with him until the bitter end.
So all he has to do is half-ass it. If he puts in a minimal amount of effort and leaves the rest of it to Eito wearing himself out, he’ll get by just barely coasting on technicality, which is a perfectly acceptable outcome.
“Are you even trying to play?” Eito complains as they leave. Takumi excused himself fairly easily, with no one particularly questioning why he left to wander the halls aimlessly given how much he does so on a daily basis.
“Sure I am. I’m never going to win, so there’s no point in giving it my all. But with enough effort, I won’t lose!”
“...I can’t tell if this is optimism or such stupidity it wraps around again,” Eito mutters in his ear, sounding mortified. Takumi considers this a win.