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The entire population was a completely mixed-up thing. Sure, being located in Japan, most people still had their Japanese or Asian roots, despite their mothers and fathers being from different countries.
To adjust to the sudden culture mix, most of the country communicated and wrote in English, although certain areas, like Asakusa, were very set on keeping their traditions ongoing and teaching their children their mother tongue. Shinra had even heard that some small villages had managed to fully become French or Russian. Apparently, the whole thing had caused a lot of chaos in the beginning, but he knew no one who had been around long enough to accurately tell the stories.
Shinra’s mother hadn’t been fully Japanese either. He remembered the soft lullabies and long scoldings that were in Spanish because it came easier to her. She hadn’t been around long enough to teach him, but to keep her with him at all times, he had learnt that language with gritted teeth.
It wasn’t really useful. Benimaru practically forced him to speak Japanese whenever they were alone, and the 8th had always communicated in English, even if he’d heard Hinawa mumble in Korean and Maki complain in German. Shinra couldn’t say that his third language was particularly helpful, but he had a habit of mumbling to himself, even if he was sure the words came out with a heavy accent.
Arthur, as far as he knew, could speak a decent amount of Japanese but mainly conversed in English, and not the American kind, of course, in which he took lots of pride for some reason. It was funny; sometimes his words were way too posh-sounding for the way he talked nonsense most of the time. So, despite the heavy mix of cultures and languages in the 8th, there had never been an issue.
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“I’m not teaching you how to say curse words in Spanish!” Shinra grumbled, elbowing his boyfriend’s side as the other tried to push even further into his personal space. They were seated next to each other at their desks, each loaded and littered with massive stacks of reports. Arthur was doing a phenomenal job at ignoring it all and would rather pester Shinra with stupid nonsense.
"Tsk, why not? A knight needs to be versatile in many languages."
"And yet I can speak more than you." Shinra retorted and just barely avoided a kick to his knee. The evening was slow but not as torturous as it usually was. The slowly departing sun was flooding the office room with orange light and a warm atmosphere, allowing the two boys to reside in some casual shirts they had found in the depths of their closet. In a typical knight response, Arthur huffed and started to pout, turning back to his paperwork as if he had ever started on actually doing it. Shinra ignored him, as he often did.
He hadn't ever thought about the fact that Arthur might want to learn Spanish, even if it was only curse words. Something about the thought made his lips twitch, but he abandoned it. His own accent was already very broken, and if he ever tried to teach it to his idiotic boyfriend, he'd be sure his ancestors would be rolling in their graves.
Next to him, the sound of a pencil moving against the page grew louder.
A few weeks later, Shinra had been tasked to cook, and Arthur had seated himself at the kitchen table with his Nintendo, small sounds and button-smashing noises coming from the little machine in his hands. Shinra wondered if the blonde was really that clingy or just loved to annoy him with those annoying sounds.
Probably both.
He had the sleeves of their orange overalls rolled up to his elbows, a potato in one hand while the other held a ridiculous-looking peeler… A courtesy from Juggernaut. The sun filtered bright yellow light through the cathedral's windows while he could hear Maki cleaning a few stray dust bunnies from the hallway. The potato peels fell into a small green bin on the counter. Every time he accidentally dropped the potato into the organic waste container containing coffee grounds, bananas and eggshells, he grumbled beneath his breath and rinsed the vegetable under cold water before dropping it into the hot pot on the stove.
He was planning on making mashed potatoes with some meat and broccoli as a side dish. Very universal and not as fancy as Hinawa's meals, but it got the job done and made Tamaki happy.
"That's counting, right? … Uno, dos… tres, cuatro… cino?" Arthur's voice broke through the calm atmosphere that had spread in the kitchen. Before even registering what the blonde was talking about, Shinra corrected him automatically with, "Cinco, not Cino. It's the—"
He cut himself off and turned around.
"Are you seriously looking up Spanish numbers now?!" He snapped, gripping the peeler tightly and glaring at Arthur, who was looking up from his console with a neutral look. "M' not looking up anything," his boyfriend defended himself, huffing as if Shinra had just insulted him. The little swoop of hair on top of his head wiggled softly.
"I'm just copying what you're saying. A true knight learns to understand his lieges." Arthur hummed, a smirk on his lips as he indulged his delusion. Shinra, however, blinked in confusion at the statement.
"Copying?"
"Yeah, you counted the potatoes you already peeled. So by now it's… uh…" Arthur stopped talking and pressed his lips together with a concentrated look before perking up again: "Nueve!"
Shinra glanced at the pot, staring at the nine naked potatoes swimming in it. He hadn't even noticed that he had started to count. And surely not in Spanish. He groaned in annoyance and flicked a single peel towards Arthur, who immediately flicked it onto the floor in return.
"Stop copying me. And it's Neuve ; don't bend the vocals, you sound French." Shinra grumbled and went back to potato peeling. The only response he received was the sound of Pokémon chattering behind him.
Had he really counted those damn vegetables in Spanish, or was Arthur just gaslighting him again? The next potato hit the cutting board a little harder than it probably should’ve, irritation flickering in his chest like a stubborn spark. Still, by the time the food was done, the kitchen smelt amazing — roasted broccoli, perfectly seared steaks, and a faint trace of garlic in the air. Shinra's new family had devoured everything with their usual chaotic enthusiasm, leaving not a single crumb behind. Somehow, despite Arthur’s infuriating smirk and exhausting presence, Shinra had managed to get the seasoning just right. The dinner was a success. His friends were happy, and he was pretty proud of his cooking, completely forgetting about the counting incident.
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Shinra didn't know why Arthur was so set on learning Spanish but was positively surprised by his process. After two weeks the blonde could confidently count to 20 and introduce himself, even after Shinra reminded him multiple times that there would literally never be a reason to introduce himself in Spanish.
His favourite pastime, without question, had become messing with Arthur. There was something endlessly satisfying about watching the knight’s face twist in confusion and irritation whenever Shinra tossed a random foreign word into a perfectly normal sentence. Sometimes he’d do it mid-conversation, just to see the exact moment Arthur’s brain stalled trying to keep up. It started as harmless fun, a way to entertain himself during dull moments, but Shinra quickly realised that he could actually use it to his advantage. Arguments, for instance, had never been easier to win. All it took was one perfectly timed Spanish sentence, and Arthur would instantly lose focus, muttering under his breath and trying to decode the meaning while completely forgetting what they were even fighting about.
Unfortunately, Shinra becoming so comfortable with his mother tongue had quickly brought him into a tricky situation. Situations like this one.
"What was it you said yesterday?"
"Huh?" Shinra asked, looking up at the blonde as his train of thoughts was interrupted. The matchbox rattled violently, making the fire soldiers inside of it bump against each other a few times, and Shinra could feel his bones ache from the unprompted movement. The mission had been rough; two collapsed buildings and an Infernal that felt specifically destructive had urged the 8th company to push to their limits.
But now, everyone was exhausted. The drive back was quiet, sometimes interrupted by Tamaki and Maki talking about what sweet treat they would get themselves once they were back. Next to Shinra, Iris was leaning against him, eyes closed but not asleep, while Hinawa and Obi silently sat in the front seats. Shinra had been more than happy to zone out and fantasise about a comfortable bed back at the cathedral, but Arthur's mind was somewhere else completely.
"Yesterday, you showed me a song, and when I looked at you, you just said something in your ancient devil language." Arthur further explained, earning himself a side-eye from Vulcan, who sat next to him.
Shinra was silent for a second, blankly staring at his boyfriend, before his mind finally caught up with the words that had left the blonde's lips, and he remembered the scenario from yesterday.
They had been lounging on the couch in the living room, watching the first few YouTube videos that came up, when Shinra had gotten the idea to show Arthur his newest favourite song. It wasn't anything special, just some rock song that a popular band had released a few weeks ago. He hadn't really expected a big reaction from the blonde, whose music taste was something else entirely, but Arthur had tilted his head in that specific way as if he had really tried to listen to the lyrics this time.
Shinra wasn’t one to compliment the egocentric knight, not even on a good day, but the way Arthur’s eyes had lifted from the screen to glance at him, the long lashes casting delicate shadows over those pretty blues, caught him completely off guard. Shinra felt his lips move almost on autopilot, words forming without thought.
"You, uh… mean: No me mires con esos ojos?" Shinra repeated in a hushed tone, feeling embarrassment creep up his neck. He had hoped Arthur would just forget about it or at least mention it in the privacy of their own room, but nothing with the blonde was ever easy.
Arthur's expression lit up with a smug smile: "Yeah, that one! What's it mean?"
Shinra grimaced. "Nothing really deep… I'll tell you when we get back; I have to make sure I'm not telling you some crap. Haha." He deflected, cursing himself for being so damn bad at lying. He really didn't want the entire matchbox knowing that he was a lovesick fool. Arthur squinted his eyes, immediately seeing through him.
"You're lying."
"I'm not!!"
"You are." Arthur insisted, and Shinra was this close to snapping back when he caught Lisa's glare in the corner of his eye. The mechanic was getting fed up with their bickering, and if Shinra didn't want to do extra chores, he'd probably just have to reveal this stupid thing. He groaned and leaned back, careful enough to make sure Iris's head didn't fall off his shoulder. There was some muffled chatter in his ear, so at least he could be sure he didn't have everyone's attention right now. Still, why couldn't he just get a normal drive back?!
Arthur, for once oddly patient and not at all concerned about his misery, looked at him with expectant eyes, fingers playing with the engravings on Excalibur's handle.
"Don't look at me with those eyes." Shinra mumbled, avoiding the blonde's sight entirely.
"What?"
"That's what it means. No me mires con esos ojos? is a direct translation of 'Don't look at me with those eyes…' You know, because you, uh… looked at me weirdly." Shinra grumbled; the last sentence was just a flat lie. Arthur's eyes were stupidly pretty, but he'd never let the annoying knight know anything about that. Silence followed, and after a few seconds of not getting any kind of reaction, Shinra looked up in confusion just to see that Arthur was insanely unimpressed by the revelation.
"Really? That was such a big deal of you to say?"
Shinra fought the urge to jump across the matchbox and strangle the blonde.
"I think it's sweet… He probably means you have pretty eyes." A soft voice next to him mumbled, sleepy and brutally honest.
His friends were awful; he should have just switched to another company in the first damn week of officially working as a fire soldier. Unfortunately for Shinra, the tired explanation of the nun made Maki and Tamaki stifle a laugh while Vulcan pretended to scroll through his phone, obviously just opening and closing apps. The silence and absolute avoidance of everyone was frying him. Shinra felt his lips twitch, a nervous smile trying its absolute hardest to appear. Instead, he took a deep breath, trying to compose himself and get ready to argue about the next stupid comment that would leave Arthur's mouth. Something that would mock him or some stupid egoistic brag that would dissolve into a speech about Camelot.
To his surprise, none came.
When Shinra finally took the courage to look back at Arthur, confused about the never-ending silence, the blonde was smiling. Not in the usual smug way; his face didn't hold the same mischief they usually did, and Shinra was once again blissfully blinded by the prettiest eyes he's ever seen. He was genuinely happy. That fact made Shinra even more flustered, feeling his face heat up even more, and he had to avoid Arthur's gaze once again.
Stupid blondes… Making his life complicated and unnecessarily hard. Shinra thought to himself but couldn't shut out the warm feeling in his chest. After an awkward 10-minute drive back and awful small talk with Lisa, the team could finally relax at the station. Shinra had immediately dragged his beaten body towards the shower stalls with gleeful hope that Hinawa would just make spaghetti for dinner. It didn't take long until he felt someone move into the stall behind him, fingers moving into his hair and pulling his head around for a kiss.
They quickly forgot about shampoo and conditioner; Shinra's hands traced over the lines on Arthur's thighs as things got more and more heated. He was happy to find out that a little Spanish brought its benefits in the form of shower sex and a very happy boyfriend.
A few days had passed, and Shinra felt the pull in his chest to use more Spanish. Especially with Arthur, due to a number of reasons. It brightened the blonde up for some reason.
Currently, however, it was somewhere between 1 and 3 am in the morning. It was pitch black inside of their little dorm room, and despite the cold October air lingering outside their window, the warmth in Arthur's bed was more than enough to keep them beneath the soft covers. The dragon lamp next to them had been turned on to the lowest setting, and Shinra could just barely make out the blonde's long eyelashes, fluttering whenever a yawn stopped his sluggish speech.
There had been no reason for them not to go to sleep. They would have to get up early the next day, and there could be an inferno alarm any second, but neither of them had made the commitment to close their eyes for good. It was nice, doing nothing for once, not bickering or fighting with each other on the rooftop. Maybe Shinra was growing soft, just a bit.
They lay next to each other on their sides, facing each other as their legs tangled and Arthur's hand played with the hem of Shinra's shirt, while his own arm was lazily sprawled across the blonde's waist.
"…and then John told me to fix the lever, but I kept bugging into the wall, and the screw wasn't even clickable... I had to restart the entire chapter again, and then…" Arthur mumbled, his voice slurred due to how tired he was, determined to finish his story. Despite claiming to hate the others' ridiculous speeches, Shinra still adored the tone of Arthur's voice when he wasn't screaming about knights. The way he pronounced the letter 'a' or pursed his lips whenever he got to a word that made his tongue stumble. The soft British accent that had dimmed through the years of talking with others was oddly charming in a weird way, even if the two had fought over the difference between fries and chips.
So Shinra just hummed along, listening to his stupid boyfriend talk on and on about the latest Sherlock Holmes game he'd been playing, complaining about bugs and details that made no sense because, of course, he'd know better.
"…so I pressed the green button and—Hey, are you listening?"
"Mhm, green button…"
"…and of course, the blue one would be the right choice, but the mechanic was actually rigged so…"
Shinra blinked softly, suppressing a giddy smile that threatened to spread onto his lips. Arthur's hair was loose this time, wild strands of golden hair falling all over his face, his blue eyes as bright as ever, always shining with a stupid amount of determination or pride that Shinra couldn't see through. Without his allowance, he could feel his own hand brush over exposed skin on the blonde's waist before travelling up and over his arm before coming to a halt near his face.
His hand reached out, softly tucking a few loose strands behind Arthur's ear so he could take a better look at the sharp features.
"Te quiero." Shinra mumbled subconsciously, softly enough not to disrupt the stupid waterfall of words coming out of Arthur's mouth.
The blonde, however, came to a halt immediately.
"Was that an 'I love you'?" Arthur perked up, a grin immediately spreading on his lips as the sleepiness evaporated from his expression entirely. Smug fucker, looking like he won something. Shinra was glad that the light source was behind him; otherwise, the blonde could see his tomato-red face right now. "Uh— well..." Shinra quickly huffed, unsure on how to explain. He cursed himself for not knowing how to keep his damn mouth shut. He couldn't have just thought about that sentence in his mind?!
"Nu-uh, no excuses now, tell me what that means!" Arthur prompted again, expression lighting up with every second.
Then and there, Shinra got reminded of why he had said it out loud. The blonde's reaction, the way his spirit immediately lifted because of some words, letters, or even some random combination that didn't even make sense to him, was addicting. It was the same sort of excitement he got whenever someone indulged his stupid knight fantasy, or they shared a kiss just before leaving for a mission.
"Ta qero…" Arthur mumbled, completely butchering the pronunciation and half the letters, tasting the word in his mouth as if it was a freebie in the grocery store. Shinra tugged at a blonde hair strand. "Stop that! You're insulting an entire language with your lips!" He hissed, his words coming out softer than intended. Arthur pouted, something he did often if he didn't immediately get his way.
"It's … similar to an 'I love you'… Like a weak form of it. You say it to family or loved ones—but you shouldn't say it to friends! That would be weird…" Shinra tried to explain, twisting the words with his tongue over and over again. The words were so simple, yet Shinra failed to describe them. Arthur's hand on his chest traced some invisible pattern onto the soft cotton of his shirt, completely at peace.
"Then what's 'I love you'?"
"Te amo."
Silence settled over them, and Shinra felt his face heat up even more. Arthur stared at him, eyes squinting a bit as if he was processing the entire situation. Then, after merely a few seconds, and with Shinra's heart almost exploding out of his ribcage, the blonde's lips parted once again.
"Te amo" Arthur murmured, quiet enough for just the two of them, in their own stupid bubble of warmth and softness.
Shinra's heart skipped several beats once again. His chest felt impossibly light, and a grin spread across his face because it had been the second time in his entire life that someone had spoken these words to him. The first had been his mother, and the second was this idiotic fool who didn't even know how to write a simple report. The English accent wasn't enough to throw him off the game anymore, not after hearing his boyfriend saying that he loved him in his mom's language. Shinra ran his fingers over Arthur's side, slipping below the loose shirt and hooking around his waist to pull him flush against his own body.
"What? No whining about my pronunciation?" Arthur asked, letting their bodies fit together like puzzle pieces. "Hah, you are totally swooned by my knightly charm." He then tried to brag and looked at Shinra with a challenging gaze, as if trying to get away from these mushy feelings by starting a playful fight.
"Shut up, don't ruin it, go to sleep." Shinra whispered back, ignoring Arthur's confused facial expression as he fully wrapped his arms around the other boy and tucked his chin on top of the blonde hair. Arthur, his face being blatantly pushed into Shinra's collarbone, made some muffled reply, but Shinra ignored it, squeezing him tight for good measure and closing his own eyes. He inhaled the blonde's scent, the soft smell of lemons and something sweet, pressing a few kisses on top of Arthur's head in adoration.
After that, the only thing that could be heard in the room was soft complaints from a certain blonde, quickly quieting down as the two only separated for a few inches to share another kiss before settling back into the sheets and giving in to sleep.
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From that night on, the little 'I love you's in Spanish became part of their daily routine. 'Te quiero' at the breakfast table or after a mission, 'Te amo' behind closed doors and after stupid make-out sessions. Even the team had picked up on it, not saying anything but exchanging knowing glances. It was comforting; a little bit of his heritage sprinkled in between chores and infernals made Shinra's heart feel softer.
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