Archive of Our Own ^beta

Akira has nightmares a lot. There are plenty of things buried in his psyche to choose from, even if it’s not a variation on a memory, but… it usually is. His first arrest. Almost dying in multiple Palaces. His friends almost dying in multiple Palaces. His second arrest and the subsequent interrogation. Getting shot. Akechi dying. There’s a lot of that last one; versions where the bulkhead door is made of an impenetrable glass and he has to watch it happen, or ones where he ends up on the other side with Akechi, but can do nothing, so they both die surrounded by looming shadows. 

Tonight, though, it isn’t any of those. Tonight, it’s white walls and perfect smiles, and the dead come back to life. Tonight, he looks on as a glassy-eyed Akechi asks him if he got what he wanted. He’s never looked like that, even when he was faking his whole personality. The spark in his eye, the one that always challenged Akira to do better and be better, is just gone. That scares him more than anything. It’s just an empty facsimile, a bad copy of someone he cares for so, so deeply. And he’s just stuck watching, trapped by his own choices.

He wakes up in a cold sweat. He’s usually not a violent waker; most days, he just pops his eyes open and rolls over to check the time. If it’s bad enough, and he knows he won’t get back to sleep, he goes to his tiny living room under the loft and sits himself down in the chair crammed into the corner. Hopefully, after an hour or so, he feels tired again and can get some more rest before whatever he has to do the next day. Morgana has a tendency to nag him about the amount of sleep he’s getting, but he gets enough to get by. Usually. 

Tonight is different in many ways. Akira jackknifes into an upright position, already breathing heavily. He barely registers how it disturbs Morgana, too focused on the heavy feeling, like something is weighing down on his chest, and the way his eyes start stinging. 

Another thing: Akira is not a crier. Not since he was a young kid. Not since he was old enough to register the meaning of his mother’s sharp words, telling him that he needed to stop. Through both arrests, the trial, and his probation, he didn’t cry. The things that happened were upsetting — traumatizing even — but he kept it all in. Crying wouldn’t help. And if he distanced himself enough from it, sometimes it felt like it was happening to someone else. He still didn’t cry when he went home to his parents either, lest they hear him and say something. Given that they didn't offer anything even resembling an apology for not listening to him about the arrest, didn't believe him when he insisted he'd done nothing wrong, and definitely didn't bother defending him from their neighbors' vitriol, he didn't think he'd be offered any sympathy. 

He didn’t let himself feel any of it until he got back to Tokyo after high school. Even then, he’s only cried here and there, never letting himself feel the full brunt of it. 

He thinks distantly that maybe that’s coming back to bite him now. Several years' worth of trauma is descending on him all at once, and he is drowning in the tears left unshed. Morgana is speaking, he definitely hears it though it sounds like the cat’s underwater. 

“Come on, Akira, you’ve gotta breathe. Copy my breathing.” 

He wriggles his body under Akira’s hand. Akira can feel him inhale, hold his breath, exhale. It takes him a while to properly copy the technique – he just can’t seem to stop crying – but he gets it eventually. Slowly and carefully, he calms down and evens out. Or, gets as evened out as he can. 

The only thing worse than the crying and panic is the shame that follows in its wake. Akira may not be the incredible and unflappable Joker anymore, but he likes to think he has a lid on things. His problems are his problems. He doesn’t make them into other people’s problems if he can help it, as a general rule. 

Looking over to where Morgana is staring up at him, eyes wide and concerned, it’s clearly too late for that. But he can do damage control. 

“Sorry, Mona. I don’t know what that was,” he tries. 

“It looks like you had a nightmare, and it made you have a panic attack,” Morgana suggests. 

“Panic attack…” he repeats. He’s never had one before, but he knows Futaba has them sometimes. He’s the one who helped Morgana look up calming techniques, actually, like the breathing exercise he just talked Akira through. 

“Do you– do you wanna talk about it?” he asks. “The nightmare must’ve been really bad to make you react that way.” Morgana’s ears have flattened to his head now, and his voice is so obviously concerned. Akira really must have freaked him out. 

Akira sighs and closes his eyes, leaning his head back against the wall. He knows for a fact that Mona will take no for an answer. They’ve had a lot of conversations about boundaries over the years, and the cat-shaped entity that has basically become his best friend has gotten pretty good about it. But he will worry. He can’t stop himself from that. And Akira hates making him worry. 

So, he starts speaking, eyes still closed. Basically just talking to the ceiling. “I was stuck in Maruki’s reality. Everything was— Well. Everything was perfect, but that fake perfect everything was then. The way it felt more like a movie set than real life.” He sighs loudly and pauses, opening his eyes to look at Morgana, who is attentively listening. “I don’t know if I’ve ever told you how much I hated that January, Mona. Everyone was smiling and happy, and there was no trash on the streets and no train delays or any of the other regular annoyances. It felt like I was going crazy. If it weren’t for Sumire and Akechi that first day…”

He trails off, but Morgana picks up where he left off. “You did spend a lot of time with Akechi that month.”

Akira snorts a little at that. “Yeah, when he’d let me. Which was usually only when we were exploring Maruki’s palace.” He pauses again. “I wanted to, though. I wanted to spend as much time with him as possible. I think I knew deep down that it was too good to be true.”

He stops talking, and there’s just silence. Morgana has never really understood his relationship with Akechi, which is fine and makes sense. None of his friends ever really have. And he gets it, he does. He would never make any of them spend time with Akechi. 

“In my nightmare, I took the deal,” he says. He can see the image so clearly in his mind's eye, even now. “I was at Leblanc, and everyone was there. They looked happy, but it felt so hollow. The way everything was then.”

As the words come out, it almost feels like Akira’s back there. Surrounded by wide smiles with nothing behind the eyes. And at the center of it all—

“Akechi was there. He looked like he did that whole year. He was saying stuff in his stupid Just Asking Questions voice.” He laughs a little at that. “Saying how everyone was happy and their lives were perfect. He congratulated me, even. Said I’d finally done it. I’d sacrificed everything about myself for other people. And then—” His voice cracks here, and he has to wrench his eyes shut. He’s trying to dispel the image from his mind, but it isn’t working. “He asked if it was worth it. Over and over again. He asked if it was worth it to sacrifice my principles and everyone’s wishes to get what I wanted.”

Morgana puts a paw on one of Akira’s hands, tightly balled into a fist, without him even realizing. “You didn’t take the deal, though,” the cat reminds him. 

“I almost did!” Akira snaps. Morgana looks back at him with wide eyes. “I was so desperate and tired and scared. I didn’t want Akechi to be gone. I didn’t want my friends to suffer anymore. If Akechi hadn’t shown up to convince me not to take the deal, I just— I don’t know. I don’t know what I would’ve done. Even then, I spent all night thinking about it. I knew what the right thing to do was, but I almost picked the selfish option.” 

He feels the tears drip down his face at the confession. He’s never told anyone this. He usually denies he ever considered it, even to himself. 

“Sometimes I think the only reason I didn’t is because he made it clear how much he would hate me for picking him over the world.” He sighs. “That’s the worst part of these nightmares. He’s never himself enough to hate me for what I did.”

“He’s still alive, though,” Morgana reminds him. “Maruki didn’t even realize that Akechi was still alive when he did that.”

“I don’t know,” Akira muses, looking at the ceiling. “Akechi never acted like the other people Maruki brought back. They were all perfect versions of themselves who only wanted to spend time with the loved ones they’d been brought back for. But Akechi…”

“Was meaner than he’d ever been,” Morgana finishes for him. 

Akira laughs at that. “Yeah. After Shido’s Palace, I guess he didn’t have anything to hide anymore. Or he was trying to push me away because he thought he was dead. Maybe both. I’ve never been sure, and he’s refused to answer since.” They don’t speak for a while, both just thinking. Then, Akira’s asks,“What does it say about me that it’s been five years and I still can’t shake that image?”

“That you’ve been through a lot,” Morgana says. “And that you and Akechi have a weird relationship.”

Akira laughs again, a little manic, a little too loud. “I don’t even think that covers half of it, to be honest.”

“No kidding.” The room turns to silence again. Morgana breaks it this time. “Do you think you’ll be able to get back to sleep any time soon?” 

Isn’t that the question of the hour? Akira only has to take a moment of self-reflection to know how unsteady he still is. Uncertainty and tension still thrum under his skin. Good thing he doesn’t have work tomorrow. He’ll be lucky to fall asleep again at all. 

“No,” he concludes. “Probably not. Sorry, Mona.”

Morgana just shakes his head, too used to his habits at this point. “It’s not your fault you have nightmares.” 

He leaves the “You should never have had to deal with any of that” unvoiced, but they’re both thinking it. While being the Phantom Thieves was incredible, it left the whole group with a laundry list of issues. “Is there anything you can think of that would help?” Morgana asks. 

Akira’s first thought, stupidly, is that he wants to hear from Akechi. He wants to see him, of course, to be sure that he’s there, but that’s not happening right now. He could technically at least talk to him, but it’s –he checks the time again – three in the morning. He doubts that a phone call would be welcome at this hour.

“You just thought of something!” Morgana accuses, despite his attempts to keep his emotions off his face. 

Akira raises his hands in defense. “It’s dumb. I’m not gonna do it.”

“It’s not dumb if it makes you feel better,” the cat reminds him. 

“I do actually think calling Akechi this late would be incredibly stupid. And not just because I think he would kill me.” 

It’s also because Akira is very aware of how awful Akechi’s own sleep schedule tends to be. It’s nothing like when they were in high school, when the guy was lucky if he got five hours of sleep a night between the rigorous Japanese school system, his public persona as a detective, and moonlighting as a supernatural hitman. Nowadays, he easily gets five hours, but usually not much more than that. Akira suspects the culprit is also nightmares, though a longstanding habit of working himself to the bone probably also factors in. But he’s never asked directly, and Akechi certainly hasn’t provided the answer on his own.

Morgana hums, thinking it over. “Maybe you don’t have to call him? You could message him, and he’ll at least answer you whenever he wakes up.”

Akira chews his lip as he considers. “I could,” he agrees noncommittally. 

Morgana sighs loudly. It’s his Every Day I Suffer sigh. “Well, you definitely won’t sleep if you don’t message him,” he says, and it’s not a question, isn’t pretending to be. Few people understand Akira the way Morgana does, and he loves leveraging this fact to win arguments. 

“I might not even if I do,” Akira counters. 

“‘Might’ is still better than ‘definitely’,” Morgana notes, his bright blue eyes narrowed. He must be getting to the bottom of his well of patience. It’s deeper than it used to be, but only by so much. Part of Akira wants to continue to argue and struggle, but a bigger part of him wants to talk to Akechi.

“Fine.”

He sighs and reaches over for his phone. Of course, now that it’s in his hand, it’s the text itself giving him pause. What to say? What will get him the answer he needs, but won’t seem too suspicious? After a few minutes of watching Akira stare at the blank text box, Morgana’s tail starts lashing. “Just send something!” He complains. 

Akira grumbles under his breath, but, honestly, he’s so tired, and his brain isn’t working properly. He’s aware there’s no amount of time that will help him come up with the perfect combination of words that he’s looking for. 

He settles on a simple:

<hey we haven’t talked in a while. how are you doing?>

When he sends it, he heaves a huge sigh, dragging a hand down his face. He enjoys talking to Akechi – he’s so happy to have him back in his life – but even doing that with the man feels like playing chess most of the time. 

“I don’t know why you spend so much time with Akechi if he stresses you out this much,” Morgana says, reading his mind. 

Akira laughs tiredly. “That’s part of the appeal.”

Morgana scrunches up his face in response. “You are so weird. Both of you.”

Akira shrugs. There isn’t much he can say to that. It’s true. 

He looks down at his phone and sees that his text message has already been read. Right. While Akira turned his off as soon as he’d gotten his phone, Akechi, like some kind of maniac, seems to keep his read reciepts on as a kind of power move. He’s been known to keep people on read for days when they annoy him. Nevertheless, his heart skips a beat at the sight. That means Akechi is awake and has his phone out. 

Akira doesn’t have time to think over what that means for him before his phone starts vibrating with a phone call. Fucking, of course Akechi would call him, instead of texting him back like a normal person. 

He sighs and answers. “Hello?”

“What’s wrong?” 

Akechi is not even pretending to do pleasantries tonight. He rarely does, having confided in Akira that he absolutely abhors small talk and wishes people would just get to the point. Akira doesn’t know why he was hoping for anything different, but he can attempt to delay the inevitable. “Yeah, I’m doing great, Akechi. How’re you this fine—” He pulls his phone away from his ear to squint at the screen. “—Thursday morning.” 

“Cut the shit, Kurusu,” Akechi bites back. “You texted me in the middle of the night. It’s not an anniversary. We have nothing coming up. It’s three in the morning. What’s wrong?” His tone leaves little room for argument.

But, that doesn’t mean Akira can’t try. “I don’t know why that means something has to be wrong.” He doesn’t know why he’s being so difficult. He wanted to call Akechi and hear his voice in the first place. Now that he’s actually on the phone, though, it’s almost embarrassing to admit out loud. 

“It does. It’s you. You would rather die than inconvenience anyone. Now tell me what’s so wrong that you texted me at such a ridiculous hour.” Akechi’s patience is clearly running thin, and he doesn’t want to put up with Akira’s antics. From the disgruntled look on Morgana’s face, neither does he. Akira leans his head up against the wall again and closes his eyes. 

“I, uh, had a nightmare.”

He winces. It sounds anticlimactic when he says it like that. And about as embarrassing as he thought it would be. 

“What about?” Akechi asks. When Akira doesn’t immediately offer an answer, he continues. “I could come up with a list of about a dozen things I can imagine your psyche torturing you with, even cutting that list down to involve myself.”

He always catches on faster than Akira wants him to. 

“The false reality,” he says after a long pause. “It was about Maruki’s reality. If I took the deal.”

There’s another pause as Akechi processes his words. “I didn’t realize you had nightmares about that as well.”

It’s a fair assessment, though Akira could say the same. Since their reconnection, there are many topics the pair skirt around. They hardly talk about the events of that year. They make vague references from time to time, but neither ever wants to address things in detail. That might mean admitting how it’s affected them, and neither is keen to do that. It’s one of the many ways they are so similar. 

Except… Well, now, Akira has broken that stalemate. He wonders if it feels like losing because, even now, everything with Akechi feels like a competition. Or maybe it’s because he’s gotten himself into a conversation where he may have to admit he’s not as coolheaded or unflappable as he loves to pretend. 

“Sometimes,” he finally admits. 

“Sometimes,” Akechi repeats, as if in agreement. “Why contact me, though?”

“Shouldn’t you have already guessed, oh great detective?” he asks, and it's bratty even to his own ears. 

“Perhaps, but I’ve been told that I should stop acting as if I can read people’s minds and let them actually tell me what they’re thinking,” Akechi says, tone starting out in an attempt at composure, though clearly through gritted teeth, and it ends sounding far more agitated. “Now will you stop fucking deflecting and tell me what’s on your mind?” 

Akira lets out a sharp breath. If Goro Akechi has ever been good at one thing, it’s pressing his buttons. If he’s good at another, it’s being frustratingly correct most of the time. 

“I just—” he starts and has to stop, to think about how to say this. “These nightmares always get to me. More than some of the others, even. That reality felt so like a dream already, even with Maruki not at full power, that I wake up and I’m not sure I have woken up. I try to ground myself, but it just feels like grasping at sand.”

Akechi hums thoughtfully. “Morgana is with you, if I’m not mistaken.”

“He is,” Akira confirms, looking down at where the feline is sitting. He is currently lying down with his eyes closed and pretending he isn’t paying attention, but Akira can see the way one of his ears is flicked in the direction of the phone call. He appreciates the simulation of privacy, at the very least. 

“Could his presence not be a confirmation of the present reality?” Akechi asks. “Why contact me?”

Now, there are a lot of reasons Akechi could be asking this question, but Akira knows which are the most likely. His best guess is a combination of: first, the need to feel special, to know that he has a special place in Akira’s life, that hasn’t abated since they were teenagers; and second, a disbelief that Akira could possibly want his presence as a comfort. Despite Akira’s attempts to convince him of the contrary, Akechi still seems to have convinced himself that he’s an unforgivable monster. He is utterly confused by Akira’s insistence that he does, in fact, want him in his life. 

“That January, you were like one of the only people that kept me… moored, I guess. To reality,” he finally admits. “Everyone else was lost in their own Maruki-induced delusions at one point or another, but you were always steady. You kept me pointed towards our goal, even when I wavered from time to time. Your conviction reminded me of my own determination to see things set right.”

“And now?” 

“And now, well,” Akira starts. He pauses, not sure if he wants to say this out loud. “You’re alive. I didn’t think you were. I spent years… not regretting, really, but wondering if things could have been different. But I also knew that whatever was still ‘alive’ in Maruki’s reality wouldn’t have really been you.” He stops, mulling over his next words. He decides he might as well just say it. “You were the one thing that made my own conviction waver. Your life being on the line.”

“Your friend's happiness didn’t sway you at all?” Akechi asks. He sounds genuinely confused. 

“Maybe in the beginning,” he says. “Before we went back in to get Sumire back. But, by the end? No. They were determined enough to win back their own happiness in our true reality, and I believed in them. But you— Well. You wouldn’t have had that option, or at least that’s what Maruki led us to believe.” 

He stops again. It’ll be hard to get the next part out, but he has to. Akechi needs to know. 

“I like to think that I would have made the right choice no matter what, but the truth is that I don’t really know. I wanted you to be alive so, so badly. I would have done almost anything. I think maybe the only thing that stopped me was that I couldn’t have gone against your wishes, and you made those crystal clear.”

Akira has gotten it out. 

Now, if Akechi would just say something before his heart beats completely out of his chest. 

“I didn’t know you felt that strongly about it,” the man says after a while. “In retrospect, I suppose I’m glad I was so harsh with you. Though, I cannot imagine why you would want to save your own murderer so badly.”

“I just wanted you to have a future,” he confesses. “However you chose to, but I hoped…” 

Akira stops himself before he finishes the sentence, though it’s probably still too late. That’s a bit too much. Too revealing. 

“Hoped for what?” Akechi asks. His tone makes clear he will not let this go. Akira doesn’t know how he could have possibly thought he would. Wishful thinking, maybe. 

“I hoped that future would include me,” he finishes at last. 

The following pause is long and impossibly loaded. Akira had almost forgotten that they were on the phone, something that becomes unbelievably apparent by the way he feels as if he’s going to drop the device from how sweaty his hands are. If Akechi doesn’t say something soon, he may actually keel over and die. 

Luckily, the man does break the silence, though not the way he expected. A rejection of some sort, certainly. A deflection maybe. 

But, no. What he says is, “I will be over in ten minutes. We can continue this discussion in person.”

And then he hangs up. 

There’s a solid minute where all Akira can do is stare at his phone. He hadn’t meant to reveal all of that. He certainly wasn’t aiming to have Akechi come over to his postage stamp-sized apartment. 

“Well, that’s my cue,” Morgana says finally, stretching before jumping down from the loft bed. Akira stares after him with wide eyes before scrambling after the feline. 

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t need to be here for… whatever’s going to happen,” he replies, his little nose scrunching up in distaste. “I don’t get you two, and I don’t think I ever will. I definitely don’t want to be your chaperone, so I’m going over to Yusuke and Ryuji’s place.”

Akira’s mouth opens and closes a few times before he finally squeaks out the word, “Chaperone?” 

The look he gets from Morgana in return is knowing and mortifying. Then, the cat turns and starts nosing his way out onto the window ledge. 

“Be safe, I guess?” Akira says unnecessarily. This isn’t the first time Morgana’s snuck out of Akira’s place by himself to go hang out with one of the other Thieves, and it certainly won’t be the last. He’s gotten pretty good at navigating Tokyo’s streets by himself. Akira can only hope Yusuke isn’t still awake and working on some new piece or another; whatever resulting argument will surely be loud enough to wake Ryuji, meaning Akira and everyone else will hear about it in the morning. 

“You should probably worry more about yourself,” Morgana tells him before finally leaping from the window. 

He’s got a point. 

Akira looks around the apartment to note that it is… passably clean. He can’t really not keep it clean due to how small it is; if he left laundry out the way he did when he was younger, there would be nowhere to walk. There are a few dishes in the sink, but it’s not overflowing. There’s still not really any space, but that’s not a solvable problem. Akechi can sit on the comfy chair crammed into the corner, Akira can sit on the desk chair, and it will be fine. Probably. 

A problem he can solve, however, is clothes. He is still in the pajamas he woke up in, and while sweats and a t-shirt are hardly the worst state Akechi could find him in, he feels he should probably make an effort. Akechi will be, given the man has presumably gotten dressed so that he can get down here on short notice. Probably on his motorcycle. 

Akira probably shouldn’t picture Akechi on his motorcycle right now. 

He picks out a t-shirt and jeans and tries very, very hard not to overthink it. A plain black t-shirt and dark wash jeans should be fine, right? Or maybe he should go with the maroon shirt. Ann complimented him on it once. He is not spiraling. He isn’t. 

He puts on the maroon shirt and the jeans. 

Glancing briefly in the mirror, he realizes he can’t even see his own reflection very well. Right. Glasses. The ones he actually needs now. Turns out repeated head trauma can fuck with your eyesight. He shoves them onto his face and looks into the mirror again; his hair is, predictably, a mess, and more than usual since he slept on it, and then spent a not insubstantial amount of time raking his fingers through it while he panicked. He also looks like he’s been crying. Probably because he has. 

God, he hates crying. 

So, he tries his best to tame his hair (to little success, mostly it just doesn’t look like he woke up two minutes ago, which he supposes is a win). Then he rinses off his face in his teeny-tiny bathroom. His eyes are still kind of red, but there isn’t a lot he can do about that. Checking the time on his phone, his heart jolts upon seeing a message from Akechi. 

<Let me in. >

As if on cue, there’s a knock on the door. Akira was hoping he had more time. He’s never had great luck. 

He lets out a deep breath. It’s fine. He feels normal. It’s just Goro Akechi at the doorstep of his shitty little apartment at — he checks the time again — three forty-five in the morning. Fine. Okay. 

He should probably open the door before Akechi kills him. Again. Ha. 

He’s coping. 

Akira finally opens the door, and Akechi is standing on the other side. This is almost worse than just imagining him, because he is physically here, and he has clearly been on his motorcycle because, aside from the slight helmet hair that only makes him look attractively rumpled, he is wearing a plain white V-neck shirt over tight jeans. And a black leather jacket that looks very, very good on him. 

He finally looks up to Akechi’s face to see the man staring at him with a raised eyebrow. Fuck. Shit. Akira was very obviously checking him out, and there’s no way Akechi didn’t notice. He must be way more tired than he thought. 

“Are you going to let me in, or are we both just going to stand in your doorway staring at each other all night?” Akechi asks. 

Akira feels himself flush. “Right, yeah, come on in.”

He steps to the side, and Akechi walks right past him, clearly inspecting the place. There’s not much for him to size up, which makes Akira feel a little sweaty all of a sudden. 

Well. Not all of a sudden. He’s been feeling sort of sweaty since he revealed he had hopes and dreams for his and Akechi’s combined futures. Which Akechi is almost certainly here to discuss. He now feels infinitely warmer and more embarrassed. It’s a wonder he’s even worse at being a human being than he usually is, which is not particularly well, but at least people usually don’t notice. 

Akechi will definitely notice. So, Akira starts doing something he never does: he talks to cover up the silence. 

“It’s, uh, not much. But it’s home.” 

He winces as it comes out of his mouth. Akechi hums wordlessly, looking at his various knick-knacks on a shelf display between the desk and his bed. He’s collected even more since he was in high school, more gifts and souvenirs from his friends. They make him happy to have, remind him of the people in his life, and all the adventures they’ve been on together. 

What Akechi can’t see right now, not without snooping far more than would be polite, is the single black leather glove tucked away in his desk drawer. Five years have passed since it was thrown at him, a year and a half since Akechi himself returned to his life, and he still holds onto it. Morgana thinks it’s strange, thinks everything about his relationship to Akechi is strange, and he definitely isn’t wrong. Most people wouldn’t keep something that was thrown at them after a speech about how much they were despised like it was a beloved keepsake gifted by someone dear to them who’s going off to war. But Akira did. Akira does. He cannot imagine getting rid of it. It used to be all he had left, and even though it isn’t anymore, it still feels like an important memory. Like that year, that rivalry, will feel less real and tangible if it was gone. 

He looks up, and Akechi is staring right at him. The expression on his face says that Akira has probably been zoning out and stuck in his own head for a while now. Instead of looking like he was trying to snap him out of his stupor, which is what his friends usually do when he gets like this, Akechi appears to have just been observing him. 

Akira can only silently blink back at him. 

“What does the future mean to you?” Akechi asks. Straight to the point, as always. 

Akira laughs without humor. “I’m a college dropout. I have three part-time jobs that I use to pay for this shitty apartment, and I can’t get a full night of sleep to save my life. So kind of a whole lot of nothing. I haven’t planned for one in years.”

“And yet it sounds like you had some sort of plan for one in high school.” He says it like it’s a challenge. 

“That wasn’t a plan,” Akira tells him with a snort. “That was a hope and a prayer. I was hoping things could go right for once, so I had a chance to figure it out. But it didn’t go the way I wanted, and I didn’t figure it out.”

Akechi glares at him, crossing his arms and looking at him like this was a test and he’s answered wrong. “And, now?”

“And, now…” Akira shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t know what you want to hear, Akechi.” If there is one universal truth, it is this: no one knows how to get under Akira Kurusu’s skin the way Goro Akechi does. The man is addicted to playing mind games. He will get straight to the point, but words his inquiries like they’re riddles he expects Akira to solve, and then gets mad when Akira can’t read his mind. It makes Akira furious, and it also makes him feel alive. It’s a feeling he’s been addicted to for years. 

“The truth, for one,” Akechi says, imperiously as always. “I’d like for you to stop pretending that you don’t know what I’m asking.”

“You could always get to the point and just ask me the question you clearly want answered,” Akira bites back, getting irritated. “I’ve told you a million times, I also can’t read your mind. You have to actually say things out loud, with your mouth.”

“And I’ve told you that you don’t have to read my mind,” Akechi tells him with a sigh, as if explaining this is both exhausting and unnecessary. It makes him grit his teeth harder in frustration. “You know me. And I know you. This should be sufficient for you to figure out what I mean.”

“If you know me so well, then I shouldn’t have to say things directly either!” Akira shouts. His anger has finally slipped the leash. It was only a matter of time, he supposes. “If you know me so well , why are you even here? Shouldn’t you know the answer to your own question?”

Akechi gives this smug little smirk at his outburst. Like this is all going just as he’d planned. Like he enjoys seeing Akira get frustrated. Blood begins pulsing in Akira’s ears. It’s been a long time since he’s been this mad.

“God, why does everything have to be some stupid test, huh?” he asks, pushing a hand through his hair just to have something to hold onto. To have something to do with his hands that isn’t punching Akechi in his stupid face. “When you said you were coming over, I thought we were going to have a conversation, not… Whatever the fuck this is!”

“We could be having a conversation,” Akechi agrees. “If you would actually answer my question.”

Akira groans loudly, tipping his head back and looking at the ceiling, if only so he doesn’t have to look at the other man right now. “You are the most frustrating man alive. I don’t know why I’m in love with you.”

There's a beat.

And then silence, as Akira realizes what he’s just said out loud. 

It’s been a long time since he’s let himself get this heated. The last time was, coincidentally, also an argument with Akechi; the man has a way of needling him that always seems to get Akira to do and say exactly what he wants. Akira just gets so emotional that all of his masks and scripts fail him. 

Like they have now. He keeps saying the things he means to keep close to his chest. He wishes he could solely blame exhaustion, or the nerves from the nightmare that still linger on his periphery, though both are surely factors. It’s not just that, though, is it? It’s Goro Akechi, and the way he makes Akira feel, and the way he seems to always manage to get what he wants from Akira. 

He looks back down at Akechi after a long moment to find that the man’s grin has solidified. It’s still smug, but now there’s an air of satisfaction about it. Once again, he’s gotten exactly what he wanted, and it makes Akira see red.

“Is that it?” he spits. “Is that what you wanted to hear? God, why the fuck could you not have asked ?”

Akechi just raises an eyebrow. “Would you have answered?”

They both know the answer to that question. Akira seethes silently. 

Akechi, frustratingly, doesn’t say a thing. Just keeps examining him. “Well?” Akira finally asks, spreading his hands out dramatically. “You found out what you wanted to know. What are you going to do now?” 

The man hums low and tilts his head to the side, as if considering his options. He’s definitely only playing at it, though; Akira is almost certain he’d made up his mind about what he was going to do before he even got here. He’s just not sure what that is. The waiting period is soon over, though, and Akira doesn’t even have time to think. 

He simply watches, as Akechi crosses the few feet between them, takes Akira’s head in his hands, and kisses him on the mouth.

The suddenness of the action is surprising enough that he spends a solid thirty seconds not moving while he processes. It’s not that he hasn’t considered that Akechi may have feelings for him as well. He defiintely has, they’ve basically been flirting since they were teenagers, and when they met up again as adults, that didn’t change much. It just hasn’t seemed like a gap that either was ready to bridge any time soon. And that was fine. Akira is patient and can wait. 

It seems like Akechi is done waiting. So, in enthusiastic agreement, Akira buries his hands in the man’s hair and just loses himself in the movement of their mouths. 

This definitely isn’t the first time he’s had the thought, but Akechi really is like if a storm were a person. He swoops in completely out of nowhere, and he never lets up until he’s done, more a force of nature than anyone else Akira’s met. As it turns out, he kisses a lot like a storm, too. Hungry, forceful, pulling at Akira’s bottom lip and digging his sharp incisors in on the next go, his tongue lapping at Akira’s teeth eagerly. Like he’s trying to prove something. He could completely devour Akira if he wanted to, with a mouth that desperate for his own, that it makes it hard for Akira to even think as he rocks back on his heels from the force of Akechi’s kiss.

When they finally separate, both breathing heavily, Akira feels like his head is spinning. He’s having a hard time processing what’s happening because he thinks that if he tries, he’ll probably do something embarrassing. Looking at Akechi, the man looks how Akira feels, his hair a mess and his face  flushed from far more than the cold. He’s beautiful. Akira’s always thought he looks beautiful, but there’s something about knowing that Akechi looks like this now because of him . 

But… there’s also a sudden weight in his chest.  He almost shoves it down, takes what he can get like he always does, but he can’t. This is too important. If he doesn’t ask now, and realizes somewhere down the line that this meant nothing to Akechi, it might break him. He looks down before he speaks, taking a small step back from Akechi’s still hovering hands.

“If you aren’t serious about this, I need to know now.” 

There’s a long beat of silence. It’s long enough that Akira finally has to look up, and is faced with a look on Akechi’s face so incredulous it’s almost comical. 

“Are you stupid?” Akechi asks. “Have you tricked me all of these years so I didn’t realize you’re actually the dumbest man alive?”

“That’s not fair,” Akira bites back. “I’ve… I’ve laid my feelings out on the table. The least you could do is give me the same.”

“I thought I’d done that when I put my tongue in your mouth.” 

Under normal circumstances, Akira would concede that Akechi has a point. As things stand, though… “You can’t just be irritating to get out of saying things. If this does mean something to you, tell me ,” he insists. 

Akechi growls, like, actually bares his teeth and growls at Akira. But he lifts his eyes to the ceiling for a moment, takes a breath, then looks back to Akira, finally saying, “I love you. I have for a while now. I was getting sick and tired of waiting for you to do something about it, so, when the opportunity to get us out of this stalemate presented itself, I jumped on it.” When he’s done, he huffs a frustrated breath, then spreads his hands. “Are you happy?” 

A smile grows on Akira’s lips. He is happy now. He does sort of want to examine what, “a while,” means for Akechi, but he’s willing to let it slide. For now, at least. He closes the distance again and grabs Akechi’s hand, twining their fingers together like he’s always wanted to, and smiles at the other man. Akechi looks a little confused about how fast the turn around was, but doesn’t say anything. 

“Does this mean we get to be boyfriends?” Akira asks with a silly grin. 

Akechi makes a little scoffing sound, just like he’d expected him to. “‘Boyfriends.’ How juvenile.”

“Then what do you want to call it, smart guy?” 

He sighs, sounding put upon. “I’d say anything other than that, but I do believe that would give you too much freedom.” Akira laughs. He’s right. Given the opportunity, he could come up with an endless list of stupid pet names just to annoy Akechi. He’ll probably still do this, a fact the other man undoubtedly knows. 

“I suppose ‘partners’ would do as a moniker,” he says, as if it wasn’t what he’d been thinking from the beginning. Akira knows him far too well to think it a spontaneous decision. 

“Aw, wanting to go back to our glory days, honey?” Akira asks, not able to help himself. 

Akechi rolls his eyes, but Akira can see the fondness in the slight smile on his lips. “If you’d really like to go back to our ‘glory days,’ as you so eloquently put it, I could always try hunting you for sport.”

“Oh, I don’t know, could be fun,” Akira says casually, like that isn’t a concept that’s featured in several detailed fantasies he’s had since he was a teenager. 

“‘Could be fun,’ he says,” Akechi scoffs. “Have I ever told you that there’s something severely wrong with you?”

“All the time,” he answers cheerily. “But luckily for you, I think right now it’s to your benefit.”

That makes Akechi pause and really look at Akira, studying his face closer. There’s an undeniable fondness in his eyes, now that Akira knows to look for it. “It is,” he agrees. “I won’t take that for granted, I swear.”

That, more than almost anything else said tonight, makes Akira feel warm and loved. So, he leans over and places a gentle kiss on Akechi's cheek. “Okay,” he whispers. “I believe you.” The words make Akechi’s face soften into a true smile, one that is small and rare and usually only comes out when the two of them are alone. 

Akira breaks the moment with a jaw-cracking yawn. 

“Sorry,” he mumbles mid-yawn. He rubs an eye. “I haven’t been getting a lot of sleep lately.”

“I know,” Akechi replies, because of course he does. Nothing as simple as Akira not telling him about it would stop the former Detective Prince from knowing. “We really should get you to bed.”

Akira frowns at him. “But I don’t want you to leave.”

“It really is remarkable how much you pout for an adult man,” Akechi says, sighing and rolling his eyes. “If you didn’t mind sharing your bed, I suppose I could stay over. If… you think that would help you sleep.”

Thinking about it, Akira kind of does. There’s something about sleeping next to a warm body that makes sleep easier. He’s noticed that at Phantom Thief sleepovers (a thing they do semi-regularly, mostly at Ann’s insistence), he tends to sleep better when he’s packed in next to Ryuji and Yusuke.

“… If you wouldn’t mind,” he finally answers.

“Akira Kurusu, when have I ever offered to do something I was not fully willing to commit to?” Akechi demands. 

“Never,” he concedes. 

Akechi waves his hand in a well, there you go sort of motion. 

“Then, let me grab you some pajamas. It should be fine, considering we’re both still basically the same size,” Akira says, wandering over to rummage in his drawers. 

“If you ignore the several inches you’ve grown since we were teenagers,” Akechi mutters. 

Akira looks over his shoulder to see the other man crossing his arms, an expression on his face that, on anyone else, Akira would call a pout. “I knew you were annoyed that I got taller!” he laughs. 

“I never said I was annoyed. I am simply stating a fact.”

“Sure, you are,” he says, pressing a black t-shirt and green plaid pajama pants into Akechi’s arms. “You can change in the bathroom, and I’ll change out here.”

Akechi simply nods in the businesslike manner he tends towards and disappears into the indicated room. 

Akira changes as quickly as he can and scurries up the ladder to his bed. The sheets are messy, though they basically always are, because he’s simply never been the kind of person who makes his bed every morning. There are two pillows, so they won’t have to share, which would be so utterly embarrassing that he can’t even dwell on it for too long. He also has extra blankets tucked away, which he probably won’t need given body heat and the close proximity they’ll be forced to share, but good to have just in case. 

He’s overthinking things again. He always overthinks things when Akechi is involved. It’s been an undeniable instinct for basically as long as he’s known the man. He always wants to impress Akechi, to do better, be better whenever he’s involved, even when it’s silly. Especially when it’s silly. 

Akira hears the door open and peeks over. His brain freezes slightly as he takes in Akechi wearing his clothes, the t-shirt fitting normally, the pants slightly too long and bunching up around his ankles. He’d never realized Akechi wearing his clothes was a thing he’d be into – though, after Akechi had made a related comment on the phone when they were in high school, he’d certainly thought about it. But with the years and intense amount of hormones removed, he thought it would feel normal. 

Akira does not feel normal about it. He’s also been staring for too long. 

“Should I be flattered by all the time you’ve spent staring at me tonight?” Akechi snarks. 

“As if you don’t know how hot you are!”

“I do,” he agrees easily. “However, it is always nice to be reminded.”

“You are something else,” Akira says, shaking his head, but there’s still a grin on his lips. 

Akechi reaches for the first rung of the ladder. “Yes, but it appears you’ve chosen me anyway,” he replies, expression soft as he climbs. 

“I have,” Akira confirms. He has for years, even when he didn’t realize that was what he was doing. From high school to the years apart to now, he will always choose Goro Akechi. For better or for worse. 

Something must show in his expression, because Akechi shoves him gently towards the headboard as he pulls himself onto the mattress. “Weren’t we going to go to sleep? You clearly need it if you’re just going to zone out and stare at me.”

“Aw, but your face is sooo pretty,” Akira jokes, but reaches over to turn off the light and starts wiggling under the blankets anyway. 

He lies down and watches Akechi follow him, examining the space for a moment before pulling back the sheets as well and laying down beside him, adjusting a little to get comfortable. Akira half expects him to say something about the quality of the mattress (which would be warranted, given how shitty it is), but he doesn’t. 

“Good night, Akira,” he mumbles, eyes closed. 

“Good night, Akechi,” he whispers back, closing his eyes as well. 

He hears the intake of breath, and there’s a pause before, “You can call me Goro.”

Akira’s heart skips. It’s a line they’ve never crossed. While he eventually convinced the young ex-detective to call him Akira, he was never given first-name privileges in return. It makes him feel special. He’s never heard anyone but the occasional boundary-crossing fan call the other man by his first name. 

“Good night, Goro,” he says, unable to stop the smile on his face. 

Akira doesn't know what tomorrow will bring, doesn’t know what the future holds for him in general, but tonight, at least, he falls into a dreamless sleep next to the man he loves most in the world. He thinks maybe that can be enough.