E G O

|| @cannonball-minimum ||

    Five in the morning: what a good time for a certain boy to be roaming down the streets towards his home.

    Being a courier at this hour seemed to be the most exhausting job Kioshi had to do in his life. But at least he was getting paid a fair wage just to deliver some packages. And with the help of his powers, he managed to get it all done in a jiffy. 

    The only drawback, however, was that he was completely drained, mentally and physically. He was barely lucky to have himself transport near his place with minimal effort. Though, all the raven could do now was dragging his feet inch by inch until he made it to the door. His mind was nearly blank, with only one thing on his mind: sleep.

    Finally reaching towards home, the weary raven unexpectedly found himself passing out rather quickly, his eyes closing right before as his entire body slamming against the front door loudly. 

For once, he had come back at a reasonable time.

While it may not be for good reasons, he had managed to get home in one piece. Being alone let him have some nice peace and quiet as he treated his wounds. It’s just a couple of scratches and bruises. nothing he couldn’t treat. So, it left him with plenty of time to lounge around and take a nap... Honestly he needed one...

Having fallen asleep on the couch, his rest lasted for quite a bit before a loud noise almost made the poor boy have a heart attack. The loud thud at the door made him shoot up from the couch as eyes were wide open.

“What the hell?!”

Was the first thing to fly out of his mouth as he moved towards the front door. He couldn’t help but be tense as he grabbed the doorknob. He had no idea what awaited him, but hesitation would not answer any of his questions. So, swallowing doubt, he opens and watches as the raven fell inside.

“... Geez. You know how to scare a guy huh Kio?”

He’s not mad, not in the slightest, a smile was even on his face as he lifts the other up. The other is a bit heavy but he manages to drag them in and place them onto the couch. Hands went into pant pockets as he glanced towards the open door. He can’t help but chuckle at how the other had spooked him. Honestly... It almost made him feel silly.

He looks back to the raven and shakes his head.

“Probably worked your ass off... You should rest. I’ll see you in the morning.”

@cannonball-minimum

Moon didn’t do street magic just so she could get attention from cute guys. She did it because it was difficult. Because unlike when she was on stage she was up close and personal with one a single audience member and while that did put her in her element it also forced her to keep on her feet. She usually chose men because, well, she was a beauty and it would be unlikely she’d really be bothering any guy. In fact they should be thankful she was deigning to use her precious time on them.

She chose cute guys because…well she enjoyed getting attention from cute guys but that was besides the point. 

Unfortunately today she was having little luck spotting anyone particularly attractive so she settled for someone of pitifully average appearance. Lucky them. “Hey, a handsome guy like you shouldn’t be making a face like that,” The line was one she’d used countless times in the past but still sounded fresh and new every time it left her lips.

Her hands were just as skilled at manipulation as her mouth if not more so. She pressed her two palms together and when she released them a small butterfly flitted out. Around her it went in a gentle dance until making its way over to Nice where it disappeared in a sudden puff of smoke, from which a rose floated down into his hands.

Today could’ve played out better.

From the mission going to hell rather quick to the minor slip up that left his right hand wrapped in bandages, the whole situation was just terrible. Honestly it made the whole fact he was chewed out a bit taste even bitter in his mouth. He had decided to go out onto the town for a bit since he now wanted to sulk for a bit. Maybe some window shopping would cheer him up? He kinda hoped so. At the very least he could find something interesting.

Yet someone had to call out to him.

“Eh...?”

He stops, eyebrow raise as the other calls him handsome. He gets a little skeptical at first as he looks at the girl. Girls don’t normally call out to him like that, so he knows this girl is up to something. Yet, he humors it. He walls over and sees what this girl wants. She didn’t seem like she had any malicious intent, but he can’t be sure of anyone’s intent... But they were out in public so it must’ve been harmless.

He watches as the girl closed her hands. This reminds him of something Birthday would do. This ended up something different however as he watches a butterfly moves towards him and suddenly turns into a rose, grabbing the rose as he examines it. He stares for a moment before a smile comes onto his face. How something so kiddish made him smile would allude him but he doesn’t mind. So, he claps with a grin on his face.

It wouldn’t have been Nice if he hadn’t responded with something casual as if he hadn’t just seen the boy he thought had died years ago metaphorically appear out of thin air. Though of course the surprise did follow, like it always did with Nice, but Skill appreciated the casual introduction, as if they were young again && back on the Facultas rooftop, talking about owning the Landmark Tower && laughing at each other’s jokes && planning for their future outside the school. ( Skill’s plans had always been more like hazy dreams; he’d never made any concrete plans, even when he escaped years later as an adult. He didn’t feel he had the luxury to plan all that way ahead when he never knew when his miracle body might give out on him. )

While his somewhat-blindness didn’t pick up subtle things anymore, really, Skill had enough common sense to know that Nice would be wondering about what happened to his body. Not just now, when he was alive without a heart, but in the past, on that fateful night when Nice had found Hajime instead of him. He wasn’t sure how he knew — that night, the one that he’d later found out was the night Nice finally found out what had happened to him ( sort of ), the night Hajime’s Nihilism Minimum had been set off again due to his older brother’s careful planning … it had mostly been spent with him clutching at the space where his heart was, a far-enough away distance that he hadn’t known what was going on, && feverish half-dreams of appearing to Hajime for a few seconds, though he’d only caught some of the words the apparition of himself had spoken. Enough to know that she was the one Nice had found instead of him, though.

          ❝   I try not to really think about it,  ❞   he said casually, as if this wasn’t an incredible meeting between two people who by all accounts should have never had the possibility of meeting again.  ❝   You know about my Minimum, right ?  Well, if not, it’s the Ego Minimum. I give other people Minimums. And, uh, they …  ❞

Years of being called by only his assignment number. The sick horror that had spread through every bit of his consciousness as they removed his limbs. The knowledge that he was the one creating the terrible monsters kept in the basement at Facultas, kids stripped of their humanity && made into nothing more than abominations.

He swallowed hard.

          ❝   … uh, they took me away and were, like, using that power, you know ?  But after a while, uhm, I got sick of it——  ❞   Understatement.  ❝   ——and, like, I left——  ❞   Murdered the staff on duty.  ❝   ——I think, mostly, by that time, my Minimum had probably been used so much it kind of spread ?  Or something. Or, like, well, it was in my heart, but now you have my heart, I know about that, but, uhm——   ❞   He was really fucking this up.  ❝   ——I don’t know, uh, I think maybe, like, it just. Stayed. Somehow. Or like maybe they couldn’t get all of my heart out, just the part they put in you, and, uh, some Minimum was left over ?  And grew back or whatever … they called me a miracle a lot, so I guess that’d make sense, like maybe before they took out my heart, my Minimum activated again ?  And like kept itself inside me or something. Well, anyway, it’s not like I’m gonna open myself up to check.  ❞

That had been a trainwreck. Thankfully, the other questions were much easier.

          ❝   You probably don’t wanna know where I was, Nice. It wasn’t a good place. You’d be really angry at Facultas for it. Uh, nii-san knows, yeah. He didn’t want to tell you yet, though. I kind of wasn’t planning to bump into you, but sometimes I drift off, and …  ❞   He hummed.  ❝   … I think he was planning on telling you himself, so I don’t know if we should tell him or not … ❞

He knew plenty enough about Skill’s minimum by this point. It’s probably the only reason he’s still alive right now. Though this also means he knows right where this conversation was going when Skill mentioned Facultas in relation to his questions. He knows the academy and its scumbag ways. He should’ve known that he was about to open a can of unpleasant worms with his questions. A dark truth that would threaten to make his blood boil. Too late now.

It made him feel horrid about not being there, not being there to help Skill. It makes him almost bitter as he looks back at the metallic parts of Skill’s body. It wouldn’t take a genius to deduce the culprit behind the missing limbs were probably the people at Facultas. They probably removed his limbs to- Fists clutched at that thought. People weren’t tools or items... Yet he knew Facultas didn’t care for that. Those bastards didn’t have morals, they didn’t care for human life or the rights of those in their “care”. He knows Facultas only saw them as numbers rather than living breathing people.

 It makes him sick, it made him wish he had been there to help Skill... That he could’ve somehow have helped him and Hajime. Yet, the past was in the past. There was no going back and altering it. They had to keep going rather than be consumed by past mistakes right? This meant he could only just be grateful that Skill had somehow survived and escape from that wretched place, even though his heart was now inside Nice and the other shouldn’t “logically” be alive.

Skill had now plenty of time to live the happy life he deserved.

It’s what brought Nice back to being calm as he nodded to the theory about the minimum also being the reason Skill was here today. That minimum brought him back from the dead, it could likely do the same for anyone... And the idea that parts of it stayed within Skill didn’t seem all that outlandish either. It originated from him, so it staying with him in some way was easy to believe. Though this was going to make it awkward that Nice still had his heart.

“Regardless of how you came back... I’m just glad that you’re back and don’t have to deal with Facultas’ bullshit anymore. So... I guess we don’t need to really find out how you came back. Let’s just live our lives freely okay? No one is in charge of us or how we live our lives now.”

He’ll make sure it stays that way. For Skill, Hajime, Art, and everyone else. He won’t let any of them be used as tools again or be harmed like that either. He gives Skill a smile despite knowing the other probably couldn’t see it. Sure, it kinda stings a bit that Skill hadn’t want to see Nice when Nice felt differently. Then again, it’s not hard to guess why the other felt like that. There was a lot to take in here...

At the talk of Art though....

“We should probably tell him... I can't keep this a secret from him, you know how smart he is... And I’ll eventually slip up since I think it’d be wrong to keep this from him... He’ll need to know the truth...”

That and Art would be royally pissed off if he had to find out on his own. After everything they’ve gone through, he wasn’t going to be an ass and hide this. The meeting was an unexpected one and Art was Skill’s brother. There was no keeping his lips sealed.

He’d known Nice was alive, if only be default. Why wouldhe have any reason to think different ?  After all, despite his godlike status as revered by the Facultas staff that had run the cruel experiments on him ( funny — he hadn’t felt like a god when they had mutilated him to fit in the machine && carried out those tests — but then again he supposed once humanity captured G-d, they were inevitably the type of creatures to saw off its wings so it could no longer fly away ), his world had remained so dark for so long. Omniscience was not part of the attributes that gave him such a status; the only thing that did that was his ability to give power unheard of to other people.

So when he’d brushed against Nice, his attention focused on something else, it wasn’t shock or anything that he reacted with, but merely a little bit of surprise. He’d sort of been hoping not to meet him again, if only to keep the unmarred, “complete” image of him in Nice’s mind instead of the mess that Art had been forced to see when he’d opened the pod.

          ❝   Nice,   ❞   he said calmly, no honorifics, just like when they’d been kids. He didn’t even want to think about what had happened since they’d seen each other last. He’d hoped to fade away from Nice’s memory, but he guessed hovering around Yokohama was going to cause their re-meeting sooner or later. He managed a small smile && tilted his head just slightly. He’d shot up, so Nice was quite a bit shorter than him now.    ❝   Isn’t my jacket kind of small for you ?  Now that you’re all grown up and everything.   ❞

The brunet never thought in his life he’d immediately tense from just hearing his name. It finally hits him right then who he had just bumped into. Complete disbelief was on his face as his brain tried to register that he was seeing Skill, Art’s brother, close friend, and someone he completely thought was dead. He even had Skill’s heart still beating inside of him... So how could the other be standing before him right now?

This was the number one thing he had never expected to happen to him and yet here he was... He was almost left completely dumbfounded by this.

It’s then that some things about the other’s appearance that bothered him. Those metallic looking arms, the visor, everything odd starts sticking out to him. He can’t help but frown as he wonders what’s happened to Skill since he’s seen him last. It seems time hasn’t been friendly to- Actually considering the fact he thought Skill was thought to be dead, time was definitely not friendly to Skill. It doesn’t change the fact how jarring of a change Skill’s appearance had taken over the years.

Fortunately the tension softly dies out with a simple question.

He smiles for a moment.

“Maybe but it doesn’t mean I can’t still wear it.”

It was his weird way of keeping Skill from fading from his memory. He’s actually grown very attached to this weird little jacket that Skill wore when they were kids. He’ll probably stop wearing it if it ever becomes seriously damaged or a health hazard. Still, he pauses for a moment before realizing he should ask a very important.

“Skill... How are you... Still alive? I mean your heart is... How did you survive? Where have you been all this time? And... Does Art know?”

Nice had thought nothing was amiss at first when someone bumped into him. He had just thought he was bumped into by someone who wasn’t paying attention. So, his first instinct was to turn around and tell them to watch it... Yet, when he had turned around he found himself freezing in place as blue eyes stared at the person before him.

Something was weird here.

“...”

He stares for a moment, confusion on his face. Something about this stranger seems dangerously familiar. That lilac hair reminds him of Art but that visor obscures their eyes, and that pale skin is strangely familiar as well. It’s weird and it leaves Nice completely confused as he feels something weird inside his chest. Was his heart racing? He’s not sure but he tries to shake it off.

“Uhh... Have we... Met before?”

“People say be careful but...”

“I’ll stop dying when I stop coming back...”