Work Text:
When Jinx pondered aloud what they should do for Malphite’s upcoming birthday, Yasuo had thought, one, he didn’t know Malphite had a birthday, and two, “We could make him a cake.”
Then, quickly realizing the implications of what he’d just suggested, he immediately backtracks, “Wait, no—”
“That’s a genius idea, Captain!” Jinx shouted, already bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Oh, what better way to show how much we care than something made from the heart? Although, I’ve never baked a cake before… Or anything, unless you count melting down metal… Ohh, learning a new skill shows how much effort we put in too! This is perfect!”
That’s how Yasuo ends up whisking together batter in the Morning Star’s kitchen at three in the morning on Malphite’s birthday so that the two of them can surprise him with cake for breakfast.
Jinx lets him do the mixing because, something about men and arm muscles and jacking off, a comment that had made Yasuo sling egg yolk at her. Still, Yasuo puts his muscles to work, and Jinx busies herself squinting at a hologram frosting recipe on the opposite counter, wondering discouraging things out loud like, “Do we even have vanilla on the ship?” and “What’s the difference between milk and cream anyway?” and “Oh oh! Do you think we should make it blue so he feels like he’s eating a piece of himself? Or would that be weird?”
It would be weird, but Yasuo doesn’t respond to any of her questions. He’s busy staring at his bowl of soft yellow goo as the whisk passes through it again and again.
(He’d had to buy the whisk himself, sneaking off into a store the last time they’d docked on a planet while Jinx distracted Malphite with nonexistent ship issues. It didn’t hit him until a while later, but it’s the first time he’ll go out of his way to do something just to make his crewmates happy.)
Birthdays.
He’s tried to stay in character throughout Jinx’s mission (titled: Big Boy’s Big Bad Birthday Bash!). It wouldn’t be like him to get emotional or touchy about what really is an innocuous event. Jinx and Malphite are nice. They don’t want the type of baggage hanging on Yasuo’s shoulders any more than Yasuo wants to burden them with it. When Jinx had brought it up, Yasuo had dodged her question of when his birthday was.
If Yasuo were interested in being vulnerable around another person, he’d say it reminds him too much of the past. Of family, of home, of everything he’s lost. His mother and brother were always more interested in the celebrations than he was. Yasuo had never learned to bake. Yone did. Yasuo was always just the greedy kid that reaped all the sweet benefits.
“This is kinda nice, y’know?” Jinx says, and it only interrupts Yasuo’s thoughts because of how soft she sounds, voice at least twenty decibels lower than what he’s used to. “It’s a real thoughtful idea, Captain. Honestly, I didn’t think you had it in you!”
Yasuo stretches his lips in what he approximates is a smile. He waits for her to see through him, call him out on it.
Instead, she leans over to peer into his bowl and, with horror, shouts, “Stop, stop, you’re overmixing it!”
In the end, against all odds, Malphite loves the cake, and he loves his presents, even though half the presents in the pile were rocks Jinx put in gift boxes and the brass knuckles Yasuo got him were about three sizes too small. It feels weird calling a creature as big and intimidating as Malphite cute, but, the way he laughs each time he unwraps another rock, the thunderous clapping along to Jinx and Yasuo’s singing, the hug he pulls the two of them into afterwards—all of it has Yasuo feeling something hot and fuzzy in his chest that, for once, isn’t the burn of alcohol. He can’t remember the last time he felt something like that.
Mission Big Boy’s Big Bad Birthday Bash! is declared a resounding success. He and Jinx even fist bump to seal the deal.
-
Two weeks before her birthday, Jinx dropped her weight onto Yasuo’s shoulders while he sat in the Morning Star’s lounge and sang, “Captain~!”
Yasuo, focused on his book, had only hummed in response.
“Y’know what day it is on the tenth?”
“Should I?”
“My birthday!!! Duh!” Then, Jinx rested her cheek on Yasuo’s shoulder and looked up at him, batting her eyelashes. “Sooo, do you have any surprises planned for me? No more cakes, please!”
Yasuo hummed again. “Was there anything you had in mind?”
There was, in fact, something on Jinx’s mind.
Piltovor is a planet the next system over, about a day’s journey away from where the Morning Star’s next destination. Its surface is almost entirely covered by steel, from its buildings to its roads to its junkyards. It’s where brilliant minds and wealthy investors make innovations happen. If Yasuo read the blueprints correctly, it’s where the Morning Star sourced her thrusters, although they’re probably unrecognizable from the original after Jinx’s tinkering. Though it’s not under their rule, Piltovor is generally crawling with enough Demaxians that Yasuo would steer them clear of the place any day.
Jinx wants to go to Zhaun, one of the moons orbiting Piltovor and a far more unpopular tourist attraction than Piltovor itself. Zhaun was once a decently sized and populated moon, but years of her mother planet mining her out and outsourcing her dirty work has turned it into an overly teched-out wreckage floating through slingspace inhabited by more guns than people. Nowadays, it’s used as a black market for Piltovor goods and a hideout for people not looking to be found.
“Home sweet home,” Jinx coos at the hologram of her hometown. She’s quick to add, “Well, the Morning Star is home nowadays, but a girl never forgets where she built her first rockets!”
Zhaun isn’t Yasuo’s top vacation destination—doesn’t even make top fifty, probably—but he’s pretty sure Jinx’s second destination choice would’ve been the ship coordinates of the ordinal that placed a bounty on his head. So they set the course for Zhaun.
Malphite and Jinx are excitedly making plans before they even land. They make references to friends Yasuo doesn’t know and places he doesn’t recognize. They take a moment to invite Yasuo along, of course, but he waves them off, already feeling like a third wheel the entire ship ride over. He didn’t want to crash the party Jinx and Malphite were clearly excited for.
“I can find my own fun just fine,” he tells them. “You two just… do what you do best.”
(Someday, when the two of them grow closer, Jinx will tell him, she invited him, not because she was scared he’d feel left out, but because she wanted him there.)
Everyone deboards the ship when they land. Everyone except Space Lizard, that is—climate’s too humid or something, knowing the creature. Jinx and Malphite skirt off into the depths of Zhaun quickly, leaving Yasuo alone to entertain himself. Yasuo and no one around to keep him in check has never led to any good decisions.
He lights a smoke, if only to brighten his surroundings a little. Zhaun spends most of its orbit in Piltovor’s shadow, metaphorically and literally; the moon is eclipsed by the larger planet most days of the year, leaving the lighting level at a consistent dark gray. At least the atmosphere has enough oxygen for Yasuo to start his lighter. It’s a rare indulgence nowadays, cigarettes from Demaxia, when half the time they’re on planets where fires can’t start and the other half he’s on the Morning Star, but he always keeps a pack on him just in case.
He finishes two smokes as he procrastinates approaching an unlabeled building he’s pretty sure is a bar, from the rowdiness inside and the drunken sway of guests walking out.
It would be nice to avoid getting into trouble tonight. It’s Jinx’s birthday.
Yasuo laughs to himself. Who was he kidding? Yasuo’s not good for anything more than making trouble for those closest to him. He didn’t even get her a present.
Happy birthday, Jinx. Hope you like substance abuse with a side of pretty distractions. Yasuo’s specialty.
He makes his way inside.
The place is a nightclub, it turns out, pulsing with live music Yasuo couldn't hear from outside. There's a woman on stage singing, something soulful and sexy that Yasuo doesn't recognize. Behind the bar, a vaguely cephalopod creature with no eyes is handing out eight drinks at a time. Overall, it's not a bad place to get wasted. Yasuo heads to the bar first, ordering a drink as he surveys his surroundings. He scans once for potential problematic figures, again for potential emergency exits, and one last time for potential partners.
With at least three secret doors identified and no one looking too much like a Demaxian official, Yasuo slides down the bar towards a woman tracing the rim of her glass. She’s alone, but that’s not quite what draws him to her in a room of options, though he couldn’t say what does. He sets his drink next to hers and leans in a respectful distance.
“What’s a beautiful thing like you doing in a place like this?” he starts, voice low enough to be a purr.
He gets an eyeroll back, and a, “That’s the best you’ve got?”
It’s the eyes, Yasuo realizes, as she looks up at him. Sure, her hair is dark enough for Yasuo to pretend it’s the shade he’s looking for, and he doesn’t mind the nice set of curves she has, but it’s the eyes, narrowed, sharp judging, like anything that comes out of Yasuo’s mouth will be a disappointment. It’s like he’s twelve again, ready to do anything to hear Yone say he’s proud of him.
“And what are you supposed to be?” she continues, arching an eyebrow as she glances him up and down, wholly unimpressed. It automatically triggers Yasuo’s need to impress. “Space pirate?”
“I prefer space wanderer,” Yasuo says, pulling out the most winning grin in his catalogue. “‘Pirate’ paints me out to be the bad guy. That’s not me. I’m more of a… wayward wanderer, drifting through space, roaming through the night, not looking to plunder anything except maybe a pretty woman’s heart.”
She doesn’t even smile, but the edge of her lips do twitch, just a little. Yasuo winks, for good measure.
“What do you say? Accompany this lone wanderer for a drink? Maybe find a connection among the stars?”
The ice in her gaze cracks—a shame; he’d expected to need at least twice as much sweet talk. She leans into his space to tug his collar. “Only if you’re paying, cowboy.”
Sarah outdrinks him (by a lot), but it hardly matters how well Yasuo can drink when he’s standing before her barstool between her thighs, and his mouth is on her neck, and her calves are stroking the backs of his knees. His hands grip the edge of the bar, not yet drifting anywhere inappropriate—they are in public—but they could certainly get there if she keeps teasing his belt with her fingers.
“Mmm, you smell good. Wonder how someone like you gets his hands on the Demaxian good stuff,” she chuckles, and Yasuo’s not nearly sober enough to unpack that sentence.
He ignores all the alarm bells sounding in his head and says, “Should we get out of here?”
“I know a place.”
Sarah’s ship is parked a short walk down the street from the venue, convenient and private enough for Yasuo to follow her there without a second thought. They board, they get handsy with each other, and everything’s going nice and smoothly until Sarah offers to take off his pants and lazily pulls the concealed photann pistol out of his pants.
It’s impressive how fast the click of the safety sobers him up. Yasuo raises his hands as the barrel of his own gun is pointed between his eyebrows. “Woah, sweetheart, I think you got the wrong idea.”
“I think the game’s up, honey,” Sarah says, face void of the sickly sweet smile he thought he’d pried out of her. “Gods, space wanderer. Does anyone fall for that bullshit?”
“It’s not bullshit, I—”
“You can drop the act. I recognized your face from the bulletins.” Now, her smile is vicious, all teeth. “You’re awfully easy for someone worth ten million clips, Captain Yasuo.”
Yasuo’s eyebrows raise, impressed more than anything else. He wasn’t aware his bounty had rocketed that high. If he gets out of here, he’ll have to compare sizes with Jinx again.
If he gets out of here. There’s more pressing matters at hand. Namely, “Damn, you’re too pretty for a Demaxian.”
She scoffs at that. “I have no love for the empire. They want heads. I deliver.”
“Then, you’ll make more the more heads you get, right?” I’m not the only one with a bounty in my crew, you should know. Ten million? Pshh, you should see the big guy.”
(For all his and Jinx’s scheming, Malphite rarely gets caught when officials show up, and when he does, he always does a good enough job faking not understanding common tongue when questioned that he’s let go half the time. So his head’s probably worth less than a tenth of Yasuo’s.)
Sarah says, “I’m listening.”
In the end, through Yasuo’s incredible bullshittery and Jinx receiving his encoded message, Yasuo is rescued from Sarah’s ship with probably too many explosions than strictly necessary. At least he gets to keep his head on his shoulders.
“Hey, thanks,” he says as he’s being carried back to the Morning Star on Malphite’s back. Their explosive exit had drawn a lot of unwanted attention, and Yasuo wasn’t sure he could walk straight.
Malphite makes a sound of No problem.
“Sorry I ruined your birthday, Jinx.”
“Are ya kidding, Captain? You gave me a chance to use my brand new guns! Best birthday ever!!!”
That makes him feel the least bit better. Yasuo sighs, almost tired of feeling sorry for himself, as he relaxes into Malphite’s hold. The unsteady ride was starting to make him dizzy. The hangover the day after is going to be brutal.
-
Two quadrants beyond the furthest reaches of the Demaxian Empire, there’s a place called Iona, a small edge planet orbiting an equally small star. Yasuo and his crew have visited once or twice since joining the Morning Star; the clear atmospheres and the beautiful landscapes are to die for, but the populations were a tad too culty and primitive for his tastes. Sure, not every planet needs to invest all their resources into inventing slingspace travel, but, come on, they almost got stranded when they ran out of fuel because nothing on the planet was compatible with the Morning Star’s driver.
Yasuo considers himself Demaxian, born and raised, but Yone and their mother were born on Iona and called themselves Ionans. The semantics never mattered much to Yasuo. It was only ever relevant in the little, inconsequential details, like Yone slipping in the occasional Ionan vocabulary in conversation or their mother dutifully praying to gods Yasuo didn’t recognize each night.
Iona, unlike Demaxia and, by extension, the rest of the galaxy, did not use the regulated intergalactic calendar. The Ionan calendar was unique and based on the number of orbits the planet made around the system’s central star, Placidium. Each cycle around Placidium marked a new month and every ten a new year. If you didn’t know what month it was, you could look up at the sky and gauge it based on the angle of the star because every cycle is a little different. If you didn’t know how to do that, you were shit outta luck.
It’s a stupid and inaccurate calendar that wouldn’t work anywhere else in the galaxy, but it was also the calendar Yasuo’s mother and brother used. Whenever Yasuo remembers his own birthday, he has to start on the Ionan calendar and do the math backwards to standard dates.
If Jinx were here, Yasuo’s probably drunk enough to explain all that to her to justify why he doesn’t tell the rest of his crew his birthday.
It’s a stupid excuse anyhow. Today is Yasuo’s birthday. He knows that already, convoluted calendar or not.
They’re flying through the empty slingspace between systems, and the Morning Star’s inner clock says it’s somewhere around midnight. Yasuo doesn’t know the exact time because the numbers are blurry even when he squints. He just knows it’s late because the lights in the main lounge have dimmed, and they weren’t dimmed when he started drinking.
He’s definitely drunk enough to admit to himself, in the dark, a sad, lonely truth: he missed celebrating birthdays.
He misses home. Demaxia. Iona. His apartment. Home brewed tea and twin-sized beds. Yone.
Fuck, it’s the first birthday he’s spending without Yone.
(Yone’s birthday was exactly one month after Yasuo’s on the Ionan calendar. Thus, every year, he made it a point to track Yasuo down, no matter what shady corner of Demaxia he was dicking around in or what jobs were keeping the two of them busy at the time. All so the two of them could celebrate their birthdays together. Sometimes, it was a dinner, or a convenience store cake, or a new ora sword that, holy shit, is the coolest thing Yasuo’s ever seen. He didn’t realize how nice it was back then, having that one consistent thing in his messy, chaotic life. At least, at the end of the year, he could count on Yone to show up.)
(Well, not anymore.)
Yone’s not around anymore, and Yasuo will have to celebrate his birthday alone, and a month from now, there will be no one celebrating Yone’s birthday because Yone won’t be fucking having another birthday ever again.
He’s turning a year older today. Yone never will. One day, soon even, Yasuo will catch up and then surpass him. One day, he’ll be older than Yone.
Yasuo’s alcohol-addled brain tries to wrestle with that. He feels dizzy. He’s been drinking the shit they got from Frejyord, and it’s strong.
A light turns on in the hallway connected to the lounge. Yasuo squints at it, blinded, as a hooded silhouette steps towards him from the light.
Sona is a strange addition to the ragtag bundle of rejects aboard the Morning Star. Maybe it’s because she’s the most put together. Yasuo had tried getting friendly with her when she first joined the crew, but she doesn’t talk much, except for whispers to her glowing orbs, and she always stares at him like she could see through him. It makes his skin crawl, so he tries to stay polite but at a distance.
“Hey,” Yasuo says, hoping she doesn’t hear the way his voice wobbles. Sona tilts her head at him. She can probably hear his thoughts or something.
“Captain,” Sona greets, adding one to the handful of words she’s ever spoken to him. “The energy in the lounge felt disturbed.”
Right, sure, whatever that means. Fuck, he can not deal with this right now. Yasuo stands, ready to make something up about needing to take a leak, but he sways on his feet and collapses face forward into the couch. Fucking Frejyord.
He lies there and prays for his head to stop spinning. He’s surprised to feel Sona sit down next to him.
“Sona, listen—” he tries.
“Despite all the traveling I’ve done with you and your crew, the temple where I grew up remains the most beautiful place I’ve seen,” Sona says. Yasuo blinks, struggling with the conversational whiplash. “The trees around it always grew tall and thick, gorged on the endless ora around us. Its gold would fill each of the cracks between the stones in the walls like a crawling, glowing web. In the spring, ora whales migrating north would pass through the area, and, if you’re lucky, you may climb onto one and fly over the forests and into the clouds. In my time there, I never got to ride one, and now, I may never get the chance.”
Yasuo stares, his jaw slack. Sona’s expression doesn’t change, but she does reach out and push his mouth shut so he doesn’t drool onto the cushions.
“What I mean to say is, I miss home too. You’re not alone, Captain.”
At the word home, Yasuo chokes on a sob, his mind full of trees larger than life and giant golden whales and sweeping green Ionan fields and Yone leaning over a counter, flipping through the pages of a calendar.
Fuck.
“Fuck.” Tears cloud his vision. Yasuo turns away so Sona doesn’t see him cry. He’s so pathetic. “Sona—sorry—I just… I’m such a piece of shit… Sorry.”
“You’re forgiven,” Sona tells him, as if it means anything coming from her. “Will you tell me of your home as well?”
-
One Ionan year ago, they celebrated Yasuo’s birthday in his new apartment. New being slightly redundant because Yasuo moved at least once a year. He never asked how Yone always managed to find his new addresses, but he showed up, at Yasuo’s doorstep, with a cake and a bottle of sake, authentic Ionan alcohol.
Yone made dinner with what little he could find in Yasuo’s fridge, and they drank, they talked, they ate, and they drank a lot more. At some point, Yone sat down on Yasuo’s ratty couch, and Yasuo sat down on the floor in front of him, forehead leaning against his knee, closing his eyes against a building headache.
Yone’s body was warm, and Yasuo’s tongue was loose, and he said, “I miss you.”
Then, Yone’s hand was in his hair, and Yasuo remembers thinking, this is all I want.
Like a floodgate opened, “I miss you. So much. Every fucking day.”
There was a long time without Yone responding, but it could just be Yasuo’s drunken brain misremembering it. He thought he’d ruined it then, that teetering balance between them where neither acknowledged how far and how eagerly Yasuo wandered away from home.
Yone could have said he had no right to miss him (true). He could have said Yasuo was a sad, pathetic man (also true). He could have said he missed him too (who knows).
Eventually, Yone told him, “I’m joining the Demaxian guard.”
“Oh.” Right. What? Yasuo opened his eyes and looked up, but Yone’s expression, as always, revealed nothing.
“Come with me.”
That had made Yasuo laugh. Him in the Demaxian guard. Yone was dreaming. Still, he said, “Okay.”
“Really?” Yone was right to be suspicious. They both knew Yasuo would never be so agreeable.
“Yeah. Okay. I’ll join with you.” He stared down Yone’s narrowed eyes and tightly drawn lips and wanted so bad it hurt. “I’ll join the guard if you kiss me back.”
Yasuo surged up, hands on Yone’s shoulders and mouth towards mouth, but he was drunk, and Yone had always been faster anyway.
He missed, catching a mouthful of Yone’s cheeks and the tiniest edge of his mouth (he still thinks about the feel of it to this day).
Yone shoved him back to the floor unceremoniously, and the room spun as Yasuo landed, a world of drunk and hurt and regret. Fuck, why had he done that.
When he looked up again at Yone’s face, all he saw was a frown of disapproval. He’d expected him to be more shocked, upset, furious. Was disappointment all Yasuo was worth to him?
“Shit,” he realized then, “You knew?”
Yone’s lack of answer was answer enough.
“You knew I…” Yasuo couldn’t say it without feeling sick. “How long…? No, it doesn’t matter. You never said anything.”
“It was better left unspoken. I thought you knew that.” Yone’s face was deadly, expression sharp enough to draw blood. “You’re my brother. I thought that would mean something to you. I didn’t think you’d throw it all away for this… nonsense.”
A lifetime of longing, and Yone watered it down to nonsense. A slap in the face would have stung less.
“You don’t get it.” How could Yone have understood? Yasuo couldn’t live like that. Years ago, he’d moved out so he wouldn’t wake up everyday and see Yone’s face and know he was sick and know it was wrong and still want to kiss him like he’s dying. But even the distance couldn’t keep the feelings at bay, and he still wanted Yone in his life, and Yone would waltz in, once a year, just to flaunt everything he couldn’t have—family, his brother, a peaceful dinner together. Each birthday just piled onto the fucking bomb Yasuo kept clamped down in his chest until he couldn’t anymore, until he exploded, until he tried to kiss Yone on the mouth and only got a taste of his lotion (it was the most delicious thing in the galaxy).
“I wouldn’t want to get it,” Yone said.
That’s fucking fair. Yasuo blinked back tears and pointed Yone to the door. “Get out. Don’t bother coming back next year.”
Yasuo had figured, when Yone walked out that door, it would be the last time the two of them saw each other.
He wasn’t exactly right because a month later, Yasuo would watch Yone die in front of him, and that’s the last time they ever saw each other.
-
“I didn’t kill him,” Yasuo says. It’s the first time he’s telling someone that. It never mattered to him that Jinx and Malphite believed the accusations—they’ve seen plenty of his cheats and lies and frauds, what’s fratricide added to the list. Yasuo was happy to let them believe it when it wasn’t far off from the truth anyway. Yasuo didn’t kill Yone, but it is his fault he’s dead.
He could’ve been there, on duty with Yone that night, instead of drunk and nursing a broken heart. He could have taken up Yone’s offer and joined the guard, but he was selfish and needy, and he cast Yone out because Yone had normal feelings about his brother. All he can ever do is want and want until he takes too much, and he realizes too late the people around him are emptied out, nothing left to take.
Because that’s all family is worth to Yasuo, huh? Jinx and the rest should run for the hills.
It’s quiet for a long time after that. Yasuo doesn’t know what Sona thinks of him, doesn’t really look forward to finding out either, probably disgusted, maybe something pitiful.
Sona’s still stroking his hair. He wonders if her ora magic somehow let her find out the motions reminds him of Yone. Yasuo thinks she’s trying to form a braid.
Eventually, Sona breaks the silence and says, “I’m glad to understand you better, Captain.”
“Yeah, well,” Yasuo snorts. That’s one way to put it. “Nothing good to find out, really.”
“I believe I can judge your character for myself.”
Yasuo grimaces. Sona finishes the last plaits in the strand of hair she picked out and tucks it back into his ponytail.
Desperate to change the topic, Yasuo says, “Did Jinx ever add your birthday to the calendar?”
“I don’t have a birthday,” Sona answers.
“What do you mean? Everyone was born some day.” Yasuo sits up from being sprawled over on the couch.
“I was never given one. Templars are merely vessels for the ora around us. You wouldn’t celebrate the day the sword at your side was created.”
Well shit, Yasuo might start now. “Fuck that. You know what, Sona? Today’s your birthday. Happy birthday. What do you wanna do?”
It takes them a long while to decide that. Apparently, Sona has never had the option to do whatever you want before, and the concept troubles her. By the time she thinks of something, the rest of the crew have woken up and are caught up with the gameplan. Jinx is distressed she never thought to update the Morning Star’s calendar for Sona, and she disappears into the cockpit immediately to rectify that. Malphite goes to the engine room to prepare the ship for their journey. Space Lizard is just happy to be there.
Sona wants to go for a walk. It’s a simple request, and Yasuo had even tried many times to ask, “Are you sure you don’t want anything more? The Morning Star can travel anywhere this side of the galaxy within the day.”
Sona didn’t want anything else. “Maybe a place with trees would be nice.”
Jinx finds the closest planet with carbon lifeforms, and they’re landing within the hour. They don’t have the ingredients or time to make a cake (not like anyone wanted that anyway), so they settle for a picnic instead. Yasuo tears the blanket off of his king-sized bed, and Malphite finds a little basket to throw most of their rations in. Sona keeps insisting all the effort isn’t necessary. They do it anyway.
It’s a nice day out. Their surroundings are so green it almost hurts Yasuo’s eyes to look up at the trees. The atmosphere is breathable and smells of something faintly sweet. No grass grows on the ground, maybe deprived of nutrients by the giant trees growing nearby, but the soil is solid and warm to lie on. Jinx picked a damned good planet to park them on. She’s Yasuo’s pilot for a reason.
Yasuo lies there, watching a blue blur scurry up the tree next to him. Even Space Lizard likes this planet.
He’s feeling the effects of the alcohol from last night. The natural air is doing wonders for his hangover at least. Still, he’s not quite energetic enough to join in on the game of catch Jinx and Malphite have started in the clearing up ahead. Yasuo closes his stinging eyes and just listens to the sounds of their laughter.
He feels someone sit down next to his head. Yasuo peeks and gets an upside down view of Sona, spectating the game, her eyes alight with amusement. She seems happy. Or maybe just more approachable now that Yasuo knows her better.
“All done with your walk?” he asks.
“Yes, it was lovely.” They both watch Jinx and Malphite for a little bit. Then, Sona says, “You’re too harsh on yourself, Captain.”
“Is this the part where you judge my character?”
“I already have.” Sona’s smile is soft. It catches Yasuo off guard because he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her smile before. She doesn’t let on what she means, and Yasuo’s too much of a coward to ask. Sona holds a piece of strange fruit up to his nose. “Space Lizard picked it.”
The fruit is delicious. Yasuo licks his lips, catching the sweet juices before they slide down his chin before he pushes himself to his feet. “Come on, let’s join their game. Jinx and Malphite won’t stand a chance if we team up.”
They do join, and soon enough, Yasuo will find out that Sona is fucking awful at catch.
-
The one year anniversary of Yasuo “killing” his brother starts with Malphite knocking on his door.
“Good morning,” Yasuo greets, and that’s all he gets before Malphite is picking him up and throwing him over his shoulder. “Uh, okay.”
He tries to figure out where they’re headed as he watches the overhead lights pass one by one. Malphite doesn’t give any indication of what he’s up to. If it were any other giant sentient rock, Yasuo would have fought back already. As it is, he lets Maphite take him wherever he pleases.
They stop at the entrance to the dining hall. Malphite sets him down, pats him on the head, and opens the door. As Yasuo’s being shoved inside, Jinx shouts, “SURPRISE!!!”
The walls and tables of the dining hall are plastered with what are clearly recycled decorations from Malphite’s birthday. Sona is clapping along to music playing from the overhead speakers as she blows on a little party popper. Space Lizard, who must have slipped out of his quarters without Yasuo noticing, perches on top of a little pile of gifts. Jinx holds a cake up to his face, and Yasuo gets a closeup look of a hand frosted caricature of himself, smiling.
“Malphite did the piping! Isn’t he a natural?!” Jinx exclaims, a little too loudly for how close she is to his ear. “Look, Captain, we knew you were keeping your birthday a secret, but then, how would we ever celebrate it? So today’s your unofficial Morning Star birthday!!! Happy one year on the ship!”
Malphite gives him a thumbs up.
“You guys shouldn’t have,” Yasuo tells them, tells all of them, really.
“Anything for our favorite captain,” Sona replies.
Jinx is insistent he save her present for last, so Yasuo opens each of his other gifts first. Space Lizard gets him the fly that’s been buzzing around the ship for the last couple days. Malphite gets him a miniature recreation of the Morning Star in an empty bottle of Yasuo’s favorite alcohol. Sona gets him a book of postcards celebrating natural beauty on Iona.
Yasuo already feels overwhelmed to the point of tears by the time he reaches Jinx’s wrapped box, and hell if he’s going to let his crew see him cry over this (nevermind the fact that they’ve all individually at some point seen him cry over something less). When he unwraps the gift, he finds a remote control, one he recognizes, belonging to the Morning Star.
“I’m pretty sure, as the captain of the ship, I already own this,” he says to her, a little confused.
“Not the remote, silly,” Jinx says, as if it’s obvious. “The windows!”
Right, this remote controls the lighting and windows in the dining hall. The walls in this chamber can flip from solid metal to a clear, floor-to-ceiling window, arguably the nicest view on the ship. It’s a great background for spaghetti nights.
As Jinx rambles, “So you know how, last week, I took the escape shuttle and kinda disappeared for a little bit? I was making the delivery we had lined up in Bilgwater early so that we’d have time to pass by here, and…” Yasuo presses the button.
The shutters open. He draws a breath.
“Tada!!!” Jinx waves her hands at the view. “I found this spot browsing the maps last month. We’re borrowing the gravity of an uninhabited planet right now, just barely out of range of the border patrol routes, but smack dab, within spitting distance of—”
“Demaxia,” Yasuo finishes with her.
It’s been a year since Yasuo’s seen his home quadrant. The empire is beautiful from afar. A cluster of asteroids orbit it along with a couple dozen small, densely populated planets, but its epicenter is the true glory of Demaxia, a space station the size of a planet. It houses millions, of which, Yasuo used to be a part of, and it’s large enough to have its own gravitational pull, hence the empire. It was hard to envision her grandeur when he was living on it, and Yasuo has spent the better part of the past year making sure Demaxia was to his back, so he’s never really had a chance to marvel at her beauty until now.
It doesn’t make much sense, but… even after everything it’s put him through, after a year of guns pointed between his eyes and bounties piled up on his head, Yasuo still looks out the viewport and misses home.
It must show on his face. Jinx slings an arm over his shoulder, and says, “Did I win?”
“Hah!” Yasuo laughs, tearing his eyes away from the glass. “I don’t know. That fly was pretty annoying.”
“Hey! Space Lizard didn’t even—”
The view of the empire is gorgeous, but even that doesn’t quite get Yasuo’s waterworks going. It isn’t until they cut open the cake, and Yasuo sees its soft lilac insides and tastes the subtly sweet cake on his tongue that he starts crying.
“Captain?!” Jinx asks, alarmed. “What’s wrong? Is the cake not—I told you his favorite flavor wasn’t fucking purple!”
Before she lunges across the table at Sona, Yasuo puts up a hand and says, “No, no, it’s good, Jinx, relax. It’s… it’s my favorite.”
Across from him, Sona’s eyes are looking into his soul. He doesn’t know if he told her this once in a drunken ramble or if she plucked the knowledge straight from his brain with her ora tainted fingers. Either way, she doesn’t call him out on the lie.
Because ube was never his favorite, not even top three. It was Yone’s.
Ube is a root of a plant native to Iona. Something about soil nutrition, ora and water acidity means it’s almost impossible to cultivate off planet, and since Iona doesn’t do exports or intergalactic trade, ube is rare and super expensive. That’s what Yone had told him anyway. The last time Yasuo tasted it must’ve been when Yone made ube cake for them when he was a kid. They weren’t well-off enough then to buy something like that regularly, but Yone had splurged one year. Yasuo didn’t like it, though, so they never had it again.
Somehow, Jinx or Malphite or Sona managed to get their hands on it with Yasuo being none the wiser.
Yasuo looks around at them, his crew, all smiling faces and soft banter. At Jinx trying to wrestle a spare plate from Malphite’s grip. At Sona petting over Space Lizard’s spikes while the lizard blows a bubble. At Demaxia behind them and the walls of the Morning Star around him.
Maybe this is what birthdays should be like: not a ghost to run from or a tally of who he’s outlived. Maybe it could just be an excuse to make noise and eat cake. A day for the people who care about you to show up. And, well, if that’s all it is, maybe it isn’t so bad.