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The news runs stories of a monster attack and Sawatari Sakurako runs through the same checklist she’s had all her life of danger level and distance and surmises she will be fine.
It’s not exactly okay, but it’s just a fact of life, especially in Tokyo.
“So, have you thought about it?” Her coworker asks. “Going somewhere else?”
“I can’t say I haven’t,” Sakurako says. “But I like it here.”
And she has people close enough she’d feel bad for leaving.
“They don’t have monsters everywhere, you know,” her coworker says. “Plenty of places don’t keep th news on, just in case.”
It’s not like it’s every day. Most monsters are fantastical, or secret.
So silly Sakurako can almost forget the cost. Rarely are there death tolls like the year 2000.
“I…”
Her phone rings.
“Sawatari?”
“Ichijou,” Sakurako says, instantly focused. “Did something happen?”
“…Godai,” Kaoru says. “Wasn’t he meant to come to town today?”
The news alerts that mooks are spreading.
“Can you fight?” Sakurako asks.
“…I’m off duty, today,” Ichijou says.
We have to find him.
Sometimes knowing someone is a terrifying endeavor.
It wasn’t always that way.
It truly was not always that way.
Not with him.
Godai Yusuke was light and freedom and wisdom incarnate - warm, intelligent, inventive, curious. He was a bright smile that made the world feel truly good for a moment and such an annoyance that he could only be her friend because he was so genuine, so eager to help.
She can’t say she never saw cracks, before. But there’s cracks, and there’s this.
Godai Yuusuke, who just rescued kids from monsters that move twistedly. Shaking. Eyes still big and bug like.
When she meets Ichijou Kaoru’s eyes, on days like today, it’s a question left unspoken.
You? Me? Us? Yes or no? How do we help?
We didn’t say enough.
What could we have done?
(A gun in his hand once, strong enough to kill monsters. Too late. Text, translation, practice. Ancient peoples in their own backyard, they spring up more and more.
There was a feared exaltation in those scripts. Never an apology.)
Us, today.
He’s warm to the touch but not burning. She always thought of him like the sun in the sky. Distant. Away and back, like clockwork.
“Godai,” she says softly. “We’re here.”
Yusuke takes a shuddering breath and nods. These days, this is rare.
He was an affectionate yet reserved person. She remembers the way he melted when he came home, the first time they saw him cry. It was weeks later. He looked—
He told them he wasn’t sure he should stay. Could stay.
Ichijou Kaoru takes his hands.
They couldn’t stop him, not so up close. Few things could. Yusuke looks down like he knows it.
Sakurako kisses him.
Her hand on his cheek is warm. Not too warm, not yet.
“You’re strong, Godai,” Kaoru says.
He told them, eventually. That it was never the same. He was never the same. When he shattered, he changed. He isn’t— but he is.
Sakurako wishes she could say she was blind, but she remembers sitting in that diner, the way Yusuke looked at his hands. She remembers every time she almost wanted to ask him to stop then reaffirmed that nothing could, not him.
Godai Yusuke was the sun. He burned more than lightning, more than rain.
She knew.
She hated it.
She knows it still. He’s stronger. He needs their help, but he can survive. He’ll be their Yusuke again.
He’s burning as he shivers. His belt glows visibly before it disappears. He passes out.
“Is it getting worse?” Kaoru asks.
“No,” Sakurako says confidently. “I don’t think so. Should we check?”
“…no,” Kaoru says. “I think it’s less often.”
“Mhm,” Sakurako says. She takes his hand. “He can’t stay in Tokyo for long. Or Japan.”
“I know,” Kaoru says.
He’d never ask them to leave their lives, either. Ichijou Kaoru will never quit the police.
“Let’s take him to my place,” Sakurako says.
“I’ve been looking at a position abroad,” Sakurako says. “He’d have another place to land, and I want to look at some of the other ancient ruins monsters have dug up for us.”
The latter was the main reason. The former mattered, too.
“Where?”
“Not Paris, not New York, not California.”
Nowhere with other threats.
“Then you’ll be safe,” Kaoru says. “Alright.”
But you’ll be alone.
Ichijou Kaoru knows that already. His hand squeezes hers. He’s accepted it.
“It’s not the same,” he says.
It’s not. It’s not all those years ago when Godai Yusuke disappeared and probably won, and one of the only ways they stayed sane was phone calls on the nights where it didn’t feel over, meetings so they could talk the secrets others knew but didn’t feel the same way.
That knowledge that he was good, he was mine, and it was my fault.
Sakurako leans against Yusuke, who is still breathing.
“It’s not,” she says.