stealhearted | after me comes the flood;

[ Akira would very much like it if Akechi would just punch him, actually, because with the way things are going Akira thinks he might be sick. He reaches out, automatically, to catch the edge of Akechi's sleeve, almost desperate.

He doesn't know what to say, he doesn't know what to say-- ]

I haven't done anything. [ It's almost like a plea, because Akira doesn't feel like he's done... anything. At all. He found out that Maruki is the center of this -- congratulations, a small child could have figured that out given that his palace was in the middle of fucking Odaiba. ]

I only wanted to stay in that reality because I thought you were happy in it. [ Until Akechi's nightmares had started, anyway, and it had been clear that Akechi couldn't let himself have nice things under any circumstances.

Which, to be fair, Akira understands. ]

You keep saying that like it means something.

[He wrenches his sleeve out of Akira's grip, turning on him.] What is it you want me to say, Kurusu? Yes, take me back to fabricated sweetness that I've known I could never really have since I was seven? Return me to what no one would but upset about regaining? A dead parent, the source of the only real love I've ever experienced-- oh, wait! You loved him, too, didn't you.

I love you! [ Akira's voice rises, because he can't help it -- it almost feels good, to be able to feel something other than the overwhelming anxious churning in his chest. There's something like anger, and a spark of determination he hasn't felt in weeks, a stubborn dedication to trying to make Akechi understand, even if it's only a little. ]

That's why I wanted you to be happy! Nothing changed for me, Akechi! I didn't -- get parents that suddenly gave a shit, or have my criminal record erased! I just got -- friends that were happier without me -- friends that didn't need me -- and you were the only one that -- and I still couldn't keep you there! Because it was hurting you -- because I missed you -- because I knew you'd --

[ Akira breaks off, thumping back against the wall again. The fight is starting to go out of him as quickly as it started, and he brings his hands up, nudging his glasses back out of the way so he can press his palms to his eyes until he can get a grip on the hysteria. ]

-- because I knew you'd be able to make a plan even if I couldn't. I didn't decide to let you wake up on your own. I was just too weak to make a decision in either direction, so you did it by yourself.

[ Because Akechi always does everything by himself, and never lets Akira help him, and maybe that's because --

Maybe that's because Akira isn't as helpful as he thought he was. ]

[He flinches, only just, at Akira's raise in volume. He lets him shout, soaks up the information hurled at him like terribly aimed projectiles. Watches him thump back against the wall, press his hands into his eyes.]

[He strides forward and reaches out, pulling his hands by the wrists away from his eyes.] Do you remember what I told you in the engine room, you fool? You really are stronger than me. You take what's given to you, terrible hands and all, and you continue. You've always persevered. My weakness has always been that I don't know how to handle the shit hand I've been dealt, so I react disastrously. I lash out. I kill people, in case you've forgotten.

[He shifts until he can walk his hands up Akira's wrists to his palms, lacing their fingers, albeit his left being a loose grip to keep from agitating the gauze wrapped around his palm.] You're the only one here who can place the pieces to the puzzles your friends are trying to solve. They're happier because they don't know any better, and they need you to show them that they can't understand happiness if they haven't ever experienced sadness.

[ With his hands removed, Akira can't hide the fact that his eyes are wet; he blinks as he listens and tries to keep the lump out of his throat enough that he doesn't dissolve. He can't break down here. He made it through his entire sentencing with like, one single breakdown, and even that was angrier than anything else -- so why is it so hard now? ]

You're the only one who... you're the only one where your perfect reality had a place for me. You're the only one that wasn't completely happy. [ Akira doesn't know how to fix that. If it's a failing on his part, that his friends could move on so quickly in this reality -- if it's just Maruki interfering. ]

I know... that they'll be angry with me for thinking that they don't need me, but -- [ But what if they don't.]

I know we have to wake them up, and I know we have to defeat Maruki, and I know what the choice I have to make is, but it feels so far away. You feel like the only thing that's real.

[He looks him over carefully-- critically.]

...I think you're wrong to assume you were completely unaffected. The nature of your abilities likely meant Maruki could only scratch the surface of your desires. I can't speak for the others, but-- however he was learning of what we supposedly wanted seems superficial. It seems shallow. And for you, it seems he didn't take into account that your happiness rides on the coattails of the happiness of everyone around you, but with the integral point of you helping them achieve it.

The powers I have at my disposal are like a diluted form of your own. [Not surprising there, given their respective track records.] So it makes sense that I woke myself up with minimal interference. [He stands a little straighter, releases one of Akira's hand to use his left knuckles to bump his face toward him, force him to look at him.] ...so what you need to progress here, is to let go of the stress he's poisoning you with. There's nothing perfect about this reality. That includes that your friends are superficially happy without your influence.

Isn't it selfish? [ Akira can't let himself have this. He wants to -- he does -- but he's as bad as Akechi when it comes to letting himself have something he doesn't think he deserves, and he doesn't think he deserves to get off the hook so easily. ]

I can't just be happy because they're happy, I have to -- [ Akira sighs, too heavy. He's not sabotaging them. He's always been supportive of them, and if he wants reality back that's just because it's real, but -- it still makes it all feel so fragile.

At least he can make eye contact now.

Akira raises his hand, slowly -- reaches out to touch the ends of Akechi's hair. He remembers comforting him after the nightmares. He remembers wondering how much of this was his fault. ]

I've always... said the things that people need to hear. I don't mind that. I've never minded being the person that people need, but -- if no one needed me, then I didn't know who I was.

[ A beat, and then: ]

But I've never had to try and be someone else with you. [ There's a vague attempt at a smile. ] I can never say the right things with you.

Tenacious, aren't you? [He follows his hand with his own to the ends of his hair, curling just the ends of their fingers together in his hair.] This isn't about me.

It is. [ If there's one thing that Akira knows, it's that. That this is as much about Akechi as it is about Akira. ]

It's been about you for a long time, for me. There's just been a lot in the way.

Akira. [He squeezes his fingers.]

I changed my mind. [ Akira says, and his smile is a little lopsided, but at least that means he isn't faking it for Akechi's sake. ]

Stay in the bed with me?

[The gentleness of it unseats him, just enough that he breaks eye contact. The memory of his mother's hands being cold surges forth, and he curls his hand tighter into Akira's.] ...okay.

Okay. [ This smile is real -- and warm. He squeezes Akechi's hand back, comfortingly -- if not very hard, given that Akechi still has a gash in his hand that bled pretty extensively, even if Akira wasn't in a state to really process it.

He takes a breath, and feels a little like himself again, for whatever "himself" counts as. Which means it's a little easier to tug Akechi back into the bedroom, even if he's a little unsteady about it.

They'll regroup tomorrow.

Akira sits on the edge of the bed, and then, carefully: ] Thank you.

[The weight of his false reality self having not slept in entirely too long crashes into him all at once, and he drops to sit beside Akira without ceremony.]

I've done nothing worth thanking me for.

Thank you anyway. [ He knows Akechi can never see what he's done for Akira. Akechi is blind to all his good qualities, and Akira understands, because Akira is coming off a multi-day breakdown about how terrible of a person it turns out he might not have been the whole time.

But still. Akira likes him. And he helped. Akira peels his jacket off, finally, considerably later than normally polite, and then just swings it over the top blanket on the bed like it's a second layer. It would add some color to the room if it wasn't, you know. Grey.

Akira doesn't try to cuddle too much -- there's a lot they haven't talked about, after all, and he's pretty sure Akechi just put off processing the bulk of what happened in the other reality by dealing with Akira -- but he does reach out, automatically seeking Akechi's hand. ]

[He makes a disgruntled sound, but exhaustion is a hell of a thing and he feels like his head and each of his limbs weigh half a ton, and soon after he drops sideways into the bed and Akira adds his jacket to the weight over them he's struggling to grasp even the dregs of consciousness.]

[As a result, he's not entirely aware that he asks, plaintively and so, so quietly:] ...you'll still be here when I wake up, right?

Yeah. [ Akira squeezes Akechi's hand, just enough to signal that he's still there. ]

I'll be here as long as you want. [ He promised the other Akechi that, too, and it was just as true. Akira wants to be around Akechi. He always has. Even when they're both... not at their best. ]

[He makes a soft sound, but his eyes are already closed, and Akira probably isn't as familiar with how light of a sleeper he is normally, here. Such is not the case, here, and he drops off into a sleep so deep he doesn't move.]

[ Akira stays awake long enough to watch Akechi sleep, and then scoots in a little closer, falling asleep with his arm pressed close enough to Akechi's chest that he can feel his steady heartbeat.

It isn't enough to stop the nightmares, of course -- his world swirls in and out of an incoherent narrative, full of Akechi dying on a ship; of Akira dying in an interrogation room; of an Akechi turning to look at him with no memory of who Akira even is.

It's a fitful sleep, all things considered. ]

[He isn't used to another person being near him when he sleeps, so while it happens slowly, Akira's fitful sleeping rouses him. He's horribly fogged from only getting a fraction of the rest his body is trying to force him into after forcing himself awake for so long, but turning his head to see Akira tense and not resting makes him roll forward. He swings his arm over his shoulders and mumbles, and none of it feels entirely real when he does it, which is probably why he doesn't question curling close enough that their knees knock and his nose winds up in Akira's hair.]

Shhhh, Akira. Shh.

[ And Akira settles down. Akechi's voice is enough to penetrate into his mind, even as asleep as he is; he internalizes it like the beginning of an alarm being worked into a dream. The dream shifts: it's soft colors and muted light and the two of them tangled together on a couch watching something on a television that changes whenever Akira looks at it, as dreams are prone to do.

He exhales, slowly, and burrows in a little deeper. ]

[And impressively, then, between the two of them they rest. Akechi may even say he hasn't had sleep that good in years, but of course, it's short-lived. He wakes up slowly with sunlight filtering in through the window, warm and comfortable and tangled in a boy he can't figure out what to think of, and his brain stays about a day in the past. He gets up carefully, extracting himself from Akira's limbs and pulling the blanket back up over him as he pads out of his room.]

[It starts to dawn on his half-conscious mind when he's disoriented by the layout of the condo, and when he gets into the living room and sees the drab state of it all, the dust and the lack of pictures, he physically feels his heart sinking into the pit of his stomach. The gash on his palm throbs and he turns his wrist outward to look at it, pressing his thumb into the gauze until it bleeds again. He sucks in a sharp breath and lets it hitch, withering his way down to sit on his uncomfortable couch and curling around a stiff pillow that doesn't match.]

[ It takes Akira a minute to rouse. Akechi was there, and then he wasn't -- Akira processes him disentangling himself, but only partially, in the way he only partially processes it when Morgana jumps on him in the middle of the night. It's the lack of Morgana and the lack of any coffee and curry in the air that finally gets him to wake up, and he shuffles out of the bed with a yawn.

He slept okay, he thinks. Probably slept harder given that yesterday was a little emotional. Today he'll probably have to fight Maruki... best not to think about it.

He steps out into the living room -- and then stops, hesitantly, looking at Akechi. The curry never got put away. Akira debates what to do for a long second, and then: ]

... do you keep coffee in your kitchen?

[He flinches, and stays still in the pillow for a moment while he tries to figure out how much face he can save. When he realizes the pillow beneath him is damp and so are his eyes, he realizes "not much" and sits up, scrubbing the heels of his hands over his eyes.]

Just-- instant, garbage. Give me a minute, there's a convenience store with decent brews this early on the corner. [He manages to keep his voice steady, somehow, but once he's done talking he settles with the heels of his hands in his eyes for a moment, swearing under his breath.]

[ Akira steps over to Akechi. Reaches out to cup Akechi's face in his hands, stroking his thumbs along the line of his jaw. ]

I can go get some. I -- [ Akira takes in a breath, because the impact of last night -- of the past two weeks -- can't just vanish that easily. His smile is a little crooked when he manages it, but it doesn't matter, because Akechi isn't looking right now anyway. ]

-- I'll feel better if I can do things for you.

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