To the point past the snowglobe. A dark mark on the wall. Maruki must also be fixating on the potential of that being a hole.
Knows he's not. Knows he can't. Knows he's incapable and far too sentimental to be looking at anything but that trinket. It's how they're different in every conceivable way. ]
I'm only out here to sort my thoughts. It won't be all night.
[ His thoughts about- ]
There's a hole in the wall, for the record. Perhaps the rats are moving in now that a beast has vanished.
He expects that's as close as Akechi will ever come to addressing it outright – her presence in their lives, and now her marked absence. It's more than he thought he'd get, really.
The shape of loss is difficult to breathe around, a solid mass tucked between his ribs. It's not as if it was surprising – Izutsumi always intended to leave, had a goal to return and find her mother. There was such finality to their last night together, out in that field, sparklers dying in their hands.
Still. It aches anyway, dull and constant. Memories are all they'll ever have now.
Memories, and a snow globe, and– ]
A hole, huh.
[ It's only mild skepticism tinging his words. Maruki squints at the mark, then shrugs. ]
Perhaps. I'm sure there are holes everywhere for those who know how to look for them.
[ By and large, their comings and goings here are entirely out of their control. He's never considered anyone escaped willingly, found a way out by force–
[ Izutsumi would have found the hole out of this world.
Aubrey found the hole out of this world.
They remain stuck in this world and he wonders, briefly, if punishment is par this world's goal.
He leans back against the couch and lets his head rest on the back of it. The ceiling is a better place to look for more rats, more holes. ]
All the powers between us and yet we can't seem to find one on our own. It's almost poetic. [ In the house, of course. ] If you're going to sleep out here, you may as well bring the bedding out. I won't have you making noise when I decide to rest.
Perhaps that power makes our scope too large. [ For the house. Of course. ] If we were to look at things a different way...
[ Maruki trails off, a hand coming up to rub beneath his glasses, too tired to truly commit to theorizing on ways they could try to break free from this reality. It's not the time for that, even if it's what they're couching this grief in.
When he drops his hand away, dark spots still dance behind his vision as the room comes back into focus, and he inclines his head toward Akechi. ]
Give me a moment.
[ It's as close as Akechi will come to saying he'll sleep out here too, and Maruki won't pass the opportunity up. He rises to his feet, stretches, ambles back upstairs to haul a too-thick comforter off Akechi's bed and grab for both of his pillows, gently shaking them out as he does. He knows the gun and his note aren't kept in there anymore, but he half-expects to see something of Izutsumi's.
Just because there's nothing there doesn't mean he isn't holding onto something somewhere else. A mouse, maybe. Or her scarf.
Back downstairs, he plops back down next to Akechi on the couch, spreads the comforter over both their laps. One pillow gets tossed to each end of the couch, in case they fall over to their respective sides when they knock out, but– Maruki's slept sitting up with Akechi before. He knows it's not unlikely they'll drift off just like this.
And he knows it won't happen anytime soon.
Eyes back on the snow globe, hands folded gently atop the plush fabric, he hums in consideration. ]
[ There's a closet somewhere with a near bursting bag full of Izutsumi's old items shoved with an intent to ensure they would never see the light of day again.
Sentimentality, second thoughts - none of that is what kept him from tossing it into a large bin in their front yard. Something else did. He can't place it now - it felt like hours. Must have only been minutes. Gnats swarmed his face until he couldn't take it.
It's because he can't stomach throwing out resources they may need. The seemingly endless winter a reminder. Maruki's tendency to collect strays at the forefront. The only one outside of Akira they shared a mutual agreement about held tight in the palm of his hand. He doesn't care about them, but he won't share his shit when the time comes. When someone is inevitably unprepared, they'll have items to divvy out.
He half expects Maruki's to throw one of her many blankets on him after finding it forced to the back of some small, cramped corner.
But it's his own that falls on him. Familiar smell, texture, color, pattern - he stifles his annoyance at his bed being unmade. Barely swallows the irritation as he pulls the cover up to the middle of his chest and adjusts the pillow behind him.
It's temporary, after all. He'll take this back to his own room in a moment. ]
It hasn't been a priority, no. What purpose would that serve?
[ Other people in their position, Maruki realizes, might act differently.
He can easily imagine someone else who knows the depth of Akechi's grief thinking that they might be doing him a favor if they wished for a photo of his mother from the crystal, or something of that nature. Bringing him a blanket belonging to a recently departed friend – because that is what Izutsumi was, is; not an ally, not a useful tool, but a friend – would have the same effect. It's not a balm to tear grief open and let its blood spill fresh. Some wounds should be left to scar over. There are enough things that happen to them that will catch and pull and reopen them on their own; Maruki won't be the one to do it purposefully.
So Izutsumi's blankets remain in the storage closets. Her toys, her clothes, her weapons. All of it tucked away from sight, never from mind.
He and Akechi are the same in that way. Perhaps it's not for the best, but it's the truth, and that's what matters in the end. ]
It's not easy to get up there by any means, but there's one spot that's conducive to laying back and watching the stars.
[ He saw Izutsumi up there from time to time. Figured out how to clamber up without ninja skills of his own, even though he panicked having to come back down. It's nothing he and Akechi couldn't try on their own. ]
With the weather warming up, the nights are getting clearer. We can try it sometime. And you can laugh if I fall and break my back, of course.
[ The implication is as clear as the patter of the softest footsteps above his room. No matter how quiet she was, he was awake and could hear it. It was worth the same weight as a door opening in the dead of night. He never cared about her comings and goings. Wasn't bothered by her presence or lack thereof.
Can't parse why tonight of all nights the snowglobe, the supposed hole behind it, the imaginary scratches along the wall - all of it irritates him.
But the weight of his own blanket against his chest doesn't. The sound of Maruki's voice doesn't. The chatter of insects outside doesn't. ]
Azathoth could patch you up quick enough. You won't have to sit with the consequences of your stupidity for long.
[ Maruki won't fall. There's no doubt in his mind. He won't fall if they climb up together. A not so small part of him hopes he does anyway. ]
I'm not against it. [ He doesn't hate looking at the stars. ] We won't have such opportunities when we return. [ His stomach churns at the thought. He can't settle on why. ] You'll be disappointed when all we end up with are bug bites though.
[ No, they won't have such opportunities when they return. Not if they stay in Tokyo, not if the inevitable end is coming for one or both of them–
Grief compounds upon grief, too many stones stacking up upon his chest until it feels like his ribs will cave in. Maruki tries to breathe around it, feels the twist and twinge between muscles, bones, soft tissue, fascia, lungs, heart. Even his blood aches. He's exhausted. ]
Then we'll do it soon. Not tonight.
[ Not tonight, no. Tonight, he only sinks down deeper beneath the comforter, slouching until just the barest edge of his shoulder touches Akechi's beneath the blankets. ]
[ It's a childish urge, one stemming from not so long ago on a couch in a different home, to utter an I'm not tired. He doesn't. Only huffs out an irritated exhale at Close your eyes. He isn't a goddamn child.
But he doesn't move.
Doesn't do anything.
He is tired. Mind and body worked up from a hole spotted hours ago. A gleam of snow globe with a delusion inside covering it up.
The hole isn't going anywhere and - ]
It isn't.
[ It's a moment after. Two. Three. Five. If Maruki fell asleep in that time, Akechi wouldn't be shocked. It doesn't stop him speaking anyway. ]
But it will only grow. Pests dig where they're most unwanted.
[ It will bloom. Not for Akechi Goro, who is accustomed to leaving sentimentality and memory behind in pursuit of something larger. It will grow for a man who hides memories in trinkets and puts them in a place all can see. Who walks over an untouched toy when he cleans. Akechi ignores the small mouse out of principle. He doesn't care if stays in a dusty corner by the stairwell.
And if Akechi lets his body relax to the point his own shoulder rests against a stalwart man -
Well it's only an accident he doesn't care to fix, much like the toy he steps over. ]
But I suppose it can be patched from the roof too.
fuckin.... cool....... do we wanna wrap here or. do you wanna kill me
[ One of the things Maruki treasures most about this secluded home they've made is how quiet it is. Somnius isn't a particularly loud town – even Stellari's city life hardly touches what he's used to from Tokyo – but the novelty of total silence has never quite worn off. When he first moved into the castle, he'd spend hours at night staring out the window in his bedroom at the inky sky speckled with unfamiliar stars, listening to wind whistling through trees and not much else, desperately missing the sounds of a city he'd spent a lifetime falling asleep to. Fondness for those quiet nights came eventually, and now–
Now he wonders if he'll miss this when they return home.
His own eyes slip shut, though sleep doesn't come just yet. The silence of the machiya tonight is heavy, solemn. Pointed, almost. Less the absence of outside hustle and bustle, more a heavy drape of mourning laid over the world to keep all possible noise out.
Grief only grows. It can't be rooted out entirely, can't be patched over and forgotten, can't heal into a clean, seamless scar. There will always be a hole. Sometimes things will catch on it, tear it open wider. Innocuous things. A toy in a corner. Flowers in a garden. Ten splints on a beam above their heads.
Maruki lays his head back against the couch cushions, exhales. Lets the warmth from his own shoulder seep into Akechi's, always perpetually cold.
They'll sleep. They'll wake. They'll go about their business. Maybe someone will find them down here on the couch together. Maybe he'll be treated to the theatre of Akechi making up unbelievable excuses.
And in a few days, or a week, or a month, when the warmth of summer buzzes through the still night air and beckons them out–
They'll look up at the stars. He'll silently pick the brightest one out for a lost friend. He'll let Akechi do the same, and they'll never speak of it, or her, ever again. ]
[ There's a persistent, unyielding hum in a dream he doesn't remember.
There may have been a snowy field. A group of three. His palms feel warm from a phantom drink he didn't try. A conversation, a game, a moment forgotten with a noise that gets louder and louder and louder.
And when he wakes up in the slow, drowsy way he's used to with a vibration, the increasing volume of an alarm he shuts off -
The rest of the dream vanishes with a crack of his neck and the relief that comes from breaking free of an uncomfortable position against a still sleeping man's shoulder.
He should get up. Get ready. Prepare for Eren's eventual arrival and a jog that never seems to wake him up.
Isn't sure what compels him to readjust the blanket around his body, press his head against the side of Maruki's arm. It's more comfortable that the shoulder he seemingly collapsed on. It's not as if he'll know.
Neither of them disappeared in the dead of night. Maybe it was the mixture of beast and human that made her special. That guided her out of a cage.
And he wonders, briefly -
Which of them will be left behind to rip the world ablaze when one finds the same path she took, that Aubrey did. Maybe they'll both manage it at once.
The odds aren't in their favor for that gamble and Akechi, for all his bets on the improbable, isn't stupid enough to drop a single chip on a false bond's promise.
It doesn't matter in the end - who stays, leaves, wanders in and out in the blink of an eye. Akechi needs to get back and he will.
And so he indulges tonight with freely given warmth - eyes the snowglobe hovering above them like a guardian. He shuts his eyes to it.
And dreams again, maybe, of a snowy field and group of three. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
[ From how long he's been sitting that slouched, shrimped up position...
Maruki sighs through his nose, looks back to the snow globe that Akechi's now taken his eyes off of. ]
We can sleep out here. If you'd like.
no subject
[ At 'we can' Akechi looks-
To the point past the snowglobe. A dark mark on the wall. Maruki must also be fixating on the potential of that being a hole.
Knows he's not. Knows he can't. Knows he's incapable and far too sentimental to be looking at anything but that trinket. It's how they're different in every conceivable way. ]
I'm only out here to sort my thoughts. It won't be all night.
[ His thoughts about- ]
There's a hole in the wall, for the record. Perhaps the rats are moving in now that a beast has vanished.
no subject
He expects that's as close as Akechi will ever come to addressing it outright – her presence in their lives, and now her marked absence. It's more than he thought he'd get, really.
The shape of loss is difficult to breathe around, a solid mass tucked between his ribs. It's not as if it was surprising – Izutsumi always intended to leave, had a goal to return and find her mother. There was such finality to their last night together, out in that field, sparklers dying in their hands.
Still. It aches anyway, dull and constant. Memories are all they'll ever have now.
Memories, and a snow globe, and– ]
A hole, huh.
[ It's only mild skepticism tinging his words. Maruki squints at the mark, then shrugs. ]
Perhaps. I'm sure there are holes everywhere for those who know how to look for them.
[ By and large, their comings and goings here are entirely out of their control. He's never considered anyone escaped willingly, found a way out by force–
But Izutsumi must have. He's sure of it. ]
no subject
Aubrey found the hole out of this world.
They remain stuck in this world and he wonders, briefly, if punishment is par this world's goal.
He leans back against the couch and lets his head rest on the back of it. The ceiling is a better place to look for more rats, more holes. ]
All the powers between us and yet we can't seem to find one on our own. It's almost poetic. [ In the house, of course. ] If you're going to sleep out here, you may as well bring the bedding out. I won't have you making noise when I decide to rest.
no subject
[ Maruki trails off, a hand coming up to rub beneath his glasses, too tired to truly commit to theorizing on ways they could try to break free from this reality. It's not the time for that, even if it's what they're couching this grief in.
When he drops his hand away, dark spots still dance behind his vision as the room comes back into focus, and he inclines his head toward Akechi. ]
Give me a moment.
[ It's as close as Akechi will come to saying he'll sleep out here too, and Maruki won't pass the opportunity up. He rises to his feet, stretches, ambles back upstairs to haul a too-thick comforter off Akechi's bed and grab for both of his pillows, gently shaking them out as he does. He knows the gun and his note aren't kept in there anymore, but he half-expects to see something of Izutsumi's.
Just because there's nothing there doesn't mean he isn't holding onto something somewhere else. A mouse, maybe. Or her scarf.
Back downstairs, he plops back down next to Akechi on the couch, spreads the comforter over both their laps. One pillow gets tossed to each end of the couch, in case they fall over to their respective sides when they knock out, but– Maruki's slept sitting up with Akechi before. He knows it's not unlikely they'll drift off just like this.
And he knows it won't happen anytime soon.
Eyes back on the snow globe, hands folded gently atop the plush fabric, he hums in consideration. ]
Have you ever been up on our roof?
no subject
Sentimentality, second thoughts - none of that is what kept him from tossing it into a large bin in their front yard. Something else did. He can't place it now - it felt like hours. Must have only been minutes. Gnats swarmed his face until he couldn't take it.
It's because he can't stomach throwing out resources they may need. The seemingly endless winter a reminder. Maruki's tendency to collect strays at the forefront. The only one outside of Akira they shared a mutual agreement about held tight in the palm of his hand. He doesn't care about them, but he won't share his shit when the time comes. When someone is inevitably unprepared, they'll have items to divvy out.
He half expects Maruki's to throw one of her many blankets on him after finding it forced to the back of some small, cramped corner.
But it's his own that falls on him. Familiar smell, texture, color, pattern - he stifles his annoyance at his bed being unmade. Barely swallows the irritation as he pulls the cover up to the middle of his chest and adjusts the pillow behind him.
It's temporary, after all. He'll take this back to his own room in a moment. ]
It hasn't been a priority, no. What purpose would that serve?
no subject
He can easily imagine someone else who knows the depth of Akechi's grief thinking that they might be doing him a favor if they wished for a photo of his mother from the crystal, or something of that nature. Bringing him a blanket belonging to a recently departed friend – because that is what Izutsumi was, is; not an ally, not a useful tool, but a friend – would have the same effect. It's not a balm to tear grief open and let its blood spill fresh. Some wounds should be left to scar over. There are enough things that happen to them that will catch and pull and reopen them on their own; Maruki won't be the one to do it purposefully.
So Izutsumi's blankets remain in the storage closets. Her toys, her clothes, her weapons. All of it tucked away from sight, never from mind.
He and Akechi are the same in that way. Perhaps it's not for the best, but it's the truth, and that's what matters in the end. ]
It's not easy to get up there by any means, but there's one spot that's conducive to laying back and watching the stars.
[ He saw Izutsumi up there from time to time. Figured out how to clamber up without ninja skills of his own, even though he panicked having to come back down. It's nothing he and Akechi couldn't try on their own. ]
With the weather warming up, the nights are getting clearer. We can try it sometime. And you can laugh if I fall and break my back, of course.
no subject
Can't parse why tonight of all nights the snowglobe, the supposed hole behind it, the imaginary scratches along the wall - all of it irritates him.
But the weight of his own blanket against his chest doesn't. The sound of Maruki's voice doesn't. The chatter of insects outside doesn't. ]
Azathoth could patch you up quick enough. You won't have to sit with the consequences of your stupidity for long.
[ Maruki won't fall. There's no doubt in his mind. He won't fall if they climb up together. A not so small part of him hopes he does anyway. ]
I'm not against it. [ He doesn't hate looking at the stars. ] We won't have such opportunities when we return. [ His stomach churns at the thought. He can't settle on why. ] You'll be disappointed when all we end up with are bug bites though.
no subject
Grief compounds upon grief, too many stones stacking up upon his chest until it feels like his ribs will cave in. Maruki tries to breathe around it, feels the twist and twinge between muscles, bones, soft tissue, fascia, lungs, heart. Even his blood aches. He's exhausted. ]
Then we'll do it soon. Not tonight.
[ Not tonight, no. Tonight, he only sinks down deeper beneath the comforter, slouching until just the barest edge of his shoulder touches Akechi's beneath the blankets. ]
Close your eyes. The hole isn't going anywhere.
no subject
But he doesn't move.
Doesn't do anything.
He is tired. Mind and body worked up from a hole spotted hours ago. A gleam of snow globe with a delusion inside covering it up.
The hole isn't going anywhere and - ]
It isn't.
[ It's a moment after. Two. Three. Five. If Maruki fell asleep in that time, Akechi wouldn't be shocked. It doesn't stop him speaking anyway. ]
But it will only grow. Pests dig where they're most unwanted.
[ It will bloom. Not for Akechi Goro, who is accustomed to leaving sentimentality and memory behind in pursuit of something larger. It will grow for a man who hides memories in trinkets and puts them in a place all can see. Who walks over an untouched toy when he cleans. Akechi ignores the small mouse out of principle. He doesn't care if stays in a dusty corner by the stairwell.
And if Akechi lets his body relax to the point his own shoulder rests against a stalwart man -
Well it's only an accident he doesn't care to fix, much like the toy he steps over. ]
But I suppose it can be patched from the roof too.
fuckin.... cool....... do we wanna wrap here or. do you wanna kill me
Now he wonders if he'll miss this when they return home.
His own eyes slip shut, though sleep doesn't come just yet. The silence of the machiya tonight is heavy, solemn. Pointed, almost. Less the absence of outside hustle and bustle, more a heavy drape of mourning laid over the world to keep all possible noise out.
Grief only grows. It can't be rooted out entirely, can't be patched over and forgotten, can't heal into a clean, seamless scar. There will always be a hole. Sometimes things will catch on it, tear it open wider. Innocuous things. A toy in a corner. Flowers in a garden. Ten splints on a beam above their heads.
Maruki lays his head back against the couch cushions, exhales. Lets the warmth from his own shoulder seep into Akechi's, always perpetually cold.
They'll sleep. They'll wake. They'll go about their business. Maybe someone will find them down here on the couch together. Maybe he'll be treated to the theatre of Akechi making up unbelievable excuses.
And in a few days, or a week, or a month, when the warmth of summer buzzes through the still night air and beckons them out–
They'll look up at the stars. He'll silently pick the brightest one out for a lost friend. He'll let Akechi do the same, and they'll never speak of it, or her, ever again. ]
i had a vision also wrapped lol
There may have been a snowy field. A group of three. His palms feel warm from a phantom drink he didn't try. A conversation, a game, a moment forgotten with a noise that gets louder and louder and louder.
And when he wakes up in the slow, drowsy way he's used to with a vibration, the increasing volume of an alarm he shuts off -
The rest of the dream vanishes with a crack of his neck and the relief that comes from breaking free of an uncomfortable position against a still sleeping man's shoulder.
He should get up. Get ready. Prepare for Eren's eventual arrival and a jog that never seems to wake him up.
Isn't sure what compels him to readjust the blanket around his body, press his head against the side of Maruki's arm. It's more comfortable that the shoulder he seemingly collapsed on. It's not as if he'll know.
Neither of them disappeared in the dead of night. Maybe it was the mixture of beast and human that made her special. That guided her out of a cage.
And he wonders, briefly -
Which of them will be left behind to rip the world ablaze when one finds the same path she took, that Aubrey did. Maybe they'll both manage it at once.
The odds aren't in their favor for that gamble and Akechi, for all his bets on the improbable, isn't stupid enough to drop a single chip on a false bond's promise.
It doesn't matter in the end - who stays, leaves, wanders in and out in the blink of an eye. Akechi needs to get back and he will.
And so he indulges tonight with freely given warmth - eyes the snowglobe hovering above them like a guardian. He shuts his eyes to it.
And dreams again, maybe, of a snowy field and group of three. ]