j'ai de l'encre plein la bouche

Endou sighs and says, “Can’t believe Someoka and Captain fought again.”

“It’s unfortunate,” agrees Kidou. “Someoka’s not used to being treated as a junior member of any team. After Inazuma Japan, I think he was expecting more.”

“I think it’s the same for all of us,” says Endou, looking down at the ball in his hands. “We’ve all had to adjust, haven’t we? He’s just not taking it well.”

“It’s his pride,” agrees Kidou. And underlying insecurity. “He should get used to it by the end of the year, though.”

Their first year on the high school soccer team has been interesting, to say the least. There’s the typical shift from being the most senior in their school to the most junior, but complicating that is their reputation. They’ve sailed into high school on the wings of their global victory; you don’t just treat someone like that the way you’d treat any other underclassman, no matter their classmates’ best efforts to remain impartial. A strange dynamic has resulted, equal parts admiration and bitterness; their coach has been having them do cooperation exercises to try to soften the bitterness and reduce the admiration to a more even playing field. It seems to be working, but slowly.

“Course, maybe next year’s captain will know how to coordinate everything,” says Endou, bouncing the ball a little in his hands as they walk; a light toss, a light catch, repeat. “Since the current one is graduating this year, and all.”

“He certainly is,” says Kidou, then, because he knows Endou is thinking it, asks, “Who do you think is going to replace him?”

“Ah…” says Endou, flustered, and shifts the ball to one hand to rub at the back of his neck with the other. “Well… to be honest, I think it’s probably going to be either you or me.”

“I’ve been thinking the same.” There’s a faint blush spread across Endou’s cheeks. “You don’t need to be embarrassed. It’s the obvious conclusion.”

“I guess,” says Endou, and drops the ball in his hands to bounce it off his foot, catch and repeat with each step. “I just… feel bad for the second-years.”

“I know,” says Kidou, and won’t admit it’s been gnawing at him. They’ve been working so hard, and none of them will get a chance at captainship because a bunch of world champion first-years have swanned into their club and taken all the good stuff. It’s hard not for the old self-blame to set in.

“I’ve been wondering,” says Endou, face in a little set frown, “if I could get Captain to pick someone else. Someone who really needs the experience, you know? I’ve already been captain. Someone else should have a turn.”

“I’ve thought the same,” agrees Kidou. “But unfortunately, I don’t think that would work out. The fact that you were captain through a world tournament means you have a lot more experience, and have acquired all sorts of skills through that experience. It would be detrimental to the team to nominate someone who didn’t know what they were doing.” Sometimes, he thinks, life just isn’t fair.

Endou elbows him. “Hey, hey, you’re a candidate too! Give yourself some credit, it’s not just me!”

Kidou shrugs. “I’m a candidate because I’m smart,” he says neutrally. “It’s just how I am, it’s not something I earned or worked for. I’m not sure how deserving it is.”

“It is too deserving.” They’ve reached a stone wall running alongside the sidewalk; Endou stops and leans against it, and Kidou does too. “And you did work for your strategy skills, and they got us all the way to nationals. Don’t sell yourself short.”

“I suppose,” says Kidou, a slow warmth running down from his head to his toes. This topic feels dangerous somehow, like reaching a hand too close to a wonderful fire, so he changes it. “Who on the team do you think would make a good captain?”

“Hm.” Endou frowns, thinking; sets aside the ball on the stone wall and crosses his arms in focus. “Tatsuki-senpai, for starters. He always seems to know exactly what the opponent is thinking.”

“True, but he sometimes misjudges his plays,” says Kidou, and leans back to stare up at the sky. “Fuuta-senpai, maybe. Everyone listens when he speaks…” He trails off. The fact of the matter is that, try as he might to think of various teammates as captain, match the armband to their face and imagine taking directions from them, there’s only one person he can ever imagine as his captain, and that’s—“But—I’d rather it be you, Endou.”

“Ah…” The blush that spreads across Endou’s face, reddens his ears, is rose-petal soft. Endou rubs at his neck, gives a little “Hehe,” and says, “Thanks, Kidou. I appreciate it.”

“It’s the truth,” says Kidou, and then, on a natural impulse, takes Endou’s hand; it’s warm and comforting as he always is. “If you became captain next year, it’d feel right.”

Endou squeezes his hand, and a ripple of warmth goes through him. “Thank you, Kidou. That’s really nice to hear.” A bird flies overhead, tracing the sunset sky. “You’d make a great captain too, you know? You already have the experience, back at Teikoku, and I know you did a great job then.”

What Kidou won’t admit is that he barely even remembers half his time at Teikoku, swallowed up as it is in repression, murky darkness, and a self he’d rather forget. What he says is, “Maybe. A lot has changed since then.”

“So have you,” says Endou, in a tone of pure and simple trust. “You’ve gotten even better. You’re really a genius, Kidou.”

Kidou finds his tongue, unties it after that compliment. “I just hope,” he says, light, teasing, pretending he doesn’t mean it, “I don’t pose too much competition to your shot at captaincy.”

“Competition? Never.” Endou leans into him, gives Kidou’s shoulder a friendly bump with his. It only brings them closer together and Kidou’s heart gives a little skip. “Whoever gets the position, I’ll be happy.”

“Me too. I’m fine either way. I hope you get it.”

“That’s good,” says Endou softly. At length he adds, “I wouldn’t mind if you became captain, Kidou. You’d be amazing at it.”

The compliment drops into Kidou’s chest, spreads warm like melting butter. “Thank you.”

“I’m just stating facts,” says Endou lightly, the words brushing Kidou’s mouth like feathers, and Kidou can’t respond because now Endou is kissing him, or he is kissing Endou, something rare and magical that has happened without either of them consciously initiating. As though a kind of magnetism decided to descend upon them and interrupt their conversation. Endou pulls away, makes a thoughtful “Mm” noise deep in his throat, readjusts, and then they’re kissing again. It’s like warm honey, something to sink into and float in. Their mouths move against each other, gentle, exploratory, and Endou’s mouth is soft and warm, and Kidou, who spent years being taught to repress his emotions, nonetheless feels something uncontrollably vast and tender well up in him and fill every corner of his body, something that has been waiting for this moment. His free hand comes up to Endou’s face to pull him closer; Endou’s cheek is soft.

After a moment they separate. They are still holding hands and neither of them speaks for a while; Endou makes a noise like he’s about to, then falls silent. The moment feels serene and untouchable, like a bubble floating in the sunset air.

Finally Kidou clears his throat. “It’s going to get dark soon.”

“Sure is,” says Endou, and pushes up off the wall, picking the ball back up in one hand, not letting go of Kidou’s with the other. They set off again. Houses pass by, shops and buildings, and after a while Endou says, “Kakera-senpai’s pass to Kazemaru today—don’t you think that’s hissatsu material?”

Kidou nods. “The way it angled around Tsuchida-senpai’s block… We should bring that up to Captain, see if they can drill it—”

And the moment sits on the stone wall behind them, the ripples of it fading.

Zero was in bad shape.

One arm torn clean off—although “clean” wasn’t quite the right word, given the jagged edges of metal and synthskin, the frayed internal cables poking through. Deep gashes in his torso, the side with the missing arm almost laid bare and one laceration extending to his face. Mechanisms and circuits in plain sight, sparking and snapping; a couple motor cables poking out of his cheek and the surface of one eye torn away to reveal the blank blue lightbulb underneath. He'd looked better.

Mechaniloids with steel-trap jaws tended to do that.

The 0th Unit had laid him out in a rock crevice away in safety; the battle was finished but they weren't going to take chances. The field medic had pronounced him, well, not currently dying, at least, but added nervously that that might change if he didn't get emergency attention. HQ had been alerted, and emergency services were on their way.

There was nothing to do now but wait. At least Zero wasn't screaming, the way any lesser reploid might—but his harsh saw-edged breathing, the contorted grimace on his face, the writhing and the teeth clenched tight to hold in the whimpers were a harrowing sight all the same. No one needed a medic to tell them that Zero was in incalculable pain.

There was a commotion at the edge of the group, and absolutely no one was surprised to see X pushing his way through. “Zero?” he inquired, voice taut with tension, and then hurried over to where Zero lay. “Zero—!”

Zero’s one good eye focused dully on him. “You’re—” he tried, and then choked off through another spasm of pain. “You’re—supposed to—be—” It seemed to be taking him a great deal of effort just to form words.

“I’ve left them in capable hands,” said X. “And most of the fighting is over. They can afford to have me come over here for a bit.” He bit his lip and stared down at Zero, at Zero’s mangled severed arm that someone had propped up next to him, then spun around and addressed the rest of the reploids. “You called medical?”

A general response of “Yes, sir.”

“How long?”

The murmured consensus was at least two hours.

“Shit,” hissed X. He contemplated Zero’s shuddering form a moment more, then dropped quietly to his knees beside him. “Zero…” It came out as a murmur, seemingly half-conscious; one hand ran over Zero’s chest, gently, skirting the damaged areas with great care, before coming up to cup the side of his face.

And then X had Zero’s face in both his hands and was leaning in and there wasn’t a single reploid present who didn’t think he was about to kiss him, except that Zero’s remaining hand came up and clumsily covered X’s face, pushing him back, and Zero said, “No.” It came with great difficulty.

“Please,” said X. “Let me do this for you—”

“I can’t…” Harsh, heavy breathing. “...let you.”

“I know my limits,” said X steadily. “And I’ll only take fifty percent. Please, let me—” His voice cracked. “I don't want to see you like this.”

Approximately thirty pairs of eyes were on the two of them, in fascinated bewilderment.

Slowly, Zero removed his hand from X’s face, and brought it around his neck instead, pulling him close.

The gesture was slow and intimate and X’s eyes slid shut as he moved in—but they didn’t kiss, and the confusion in the rocky corner of the dead battlefield only grew as X pressed the crystal on his forehead to Zero’s. A mental link? At a time like this? What crucial information needed to be delivered in such high security at this moment, and what was that they were talking about just—

The two crystals began to give a gentle pulsing glow, in unison, and X’s fingers began to tighten on Zero’s face.

Rapt attention from the surrounding audience as the link continued. X removed one hand from Zero’s face, braced it on the ground, and his fingers scraped against the rock; a grimace crept over his face and his spine curled inward, tense and shivering. Zero’s spasming subsided, his breath coming a little less harsh, his mouth relaxing from where he’d been biting down on his bottom lip in agony. A choking sound came from X’s throat, a jerky string of noises of unmistakeable pain—

Pain?

X’s eyes opened and he pulled away, his movements stiff and labored. The crystal on his forehead continued pulsing in gentle unison with Zero’s. “How…” he began, broke off, took a shaky breath, and tried again. “How is it now?”

“Bit better,” croaked Zero. He shifted, as though testing his injuries, and winced; X winced in unison, and Zero managed to give a shaky grin even with half his cheek torn away. “You're... too sentimental... you know that?”

He was clearly still in pain, but it didn't seem to be at all as bad as before; and X was slowly, painstakingly settling into a sitting position next to him with closed eyes and labored breathing. The collective bewilderment began cresting into disbelief.

—a mental link was one thing already, supremely vulnerable, kind of embarrassing really, used in official settings only for emergency transfers of information, but the kind of depth of interface needed to—to—to take someone’s pain off of them? No mere exchange of memory, but reaching deep into someone’s core, into the deepest and most primal parts of them, and willingly taking that kind of a burden off their hands? With an ease and fluidity implying they’d connected on that close and entwined a level before? That was—that was—

—intimate. A few of the reploids present began coughing, averting their gazes, awkwardly shuffling their feet, with the growing feeling that they were witnessing something deeply private; something they weren’t supposed to be seeing.

When medical arrived there was a general rearranging of the crowd to let them through. Lifesaver gazed for a moment at both Zero and X wracked with pain, and whipped around to stare at the nearest 0th Unit member. “I thought you said only Zero was hurt.”

“He was—” In bits and pieces from the surrounding crowd, the story was relayed.

Lifesaver pinched his nose and stared down at the two prone figures. “That was very stupid of you.”

“See?” gasped Zero, turning to X, and X offered up a weak smile. “Sorry.”

“All right, all right, we'll save that for later. Can you stand?“

X climbed to his feet, slowly, painstakingly. Zero followed, or tried to; with only one arm to prop himself up, he fell over again, and X’s whole body shuddered from the echo of the impact.

Lifesaver’s frown deepened. “X, cut the connection.”

X shook his head.

“X. You've done enough.”

“I'm not cutting it as long as he's conscious,” gritted out X.

Lifesaver turned in exasperation to the medical team, who provided an assortment of shrugs. Two of them stepped forward and hauled Zero up by his remaining arm—he and X cried out in unison. Zero was maneuvered into the stretcher with hisses of pain as X's teeth gritted and his fists clenched. Someone picked up Zero's other arm, lying a few feet away, and laid it down on the stretcher next to him like an oversized chew toy.

“Roll him over,” instructed Lifesaver. “Find the emergency switch. We're not going to be able to form the proper procedures on him if he's still conscious.” He glared at X. “After this the link will be severed, yes?”

X could only offer up a weak nod.

“Good.” The emergency hatch on Zero’s back was popped open. A tiny numbers pad, the override code keyed in with hurried precision, and then Lifesaver pressed the off button.

There was a click. X gasped at the sudden lack of connection, swaying like a puppet with cut strings even as Zero went limp and his machinery powered down with a soft whine. Two of the squad rushed forward to help him, but he steadied himself and held out a hand to stay them.

“I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.” Absently, he touched his cheek, as though wondering to find it intact. “Lifesaver, will he be all right?”

The harshness and labor of pain were gone from his voice, and he was standing up straight again. Everyone was watching with a certain degree of awe, gazes flitting to Zero on the stretcher.

“He should be all right,” said Lifesaver grimly. “But it’ll be long and complicated getting him back to normal. Several hours of surgery before we can even get started on the external repairs.” Grudgingly he added, after a moment, “You probably saved him a world of hurt.”

“I did what I could.”

“For Zero, certainly.” X grimaced at that. One didn’t get to be a high-profile Hunter in an ambiguous relationship with another high-profile Hunter without enduring certain rebukes on unprofessional favoritism. “We’re going back to base. Are there any more seriously wounded?”

X turned around, taking in the assembled reploids and apparently performing a quick head count. “Most of them were able to teleport back on their own… There are a couple over in the 17th Unit who were having difficulty, though. I’ll show you to them...”

“Please do.”

With one last glance at Zero, now being loaded into the emergency vehicle, X left; Lifesaver followed. The 0th Unit was left to stare—at each other, at the splashes of motor oil on the bare rock where Zero’s wounded form had been.

When an intact and repaired Zero was wheeled out of the repair bay many exhausted hours later, a new layer of solder scars the only indication of what he'd been through, X was waiting for him, hurrying over to the gurney and bracing his hands besides Zero’s prone form. Zero came back online, blue eyes opening slowly, and as he began to sit up X’s arms went around him; they held each other tightly for a very long time.

By wordless agreement, everyone gave them their space.

They weren’t actually aliens, of course. That was a pretext. That was the lie that came out and has faded. Of course aliens wouldn’t look like completely normal humans in funny clothes, and it’s dubious they would play soccer. Of course, it was all a charade. Everyone’s used to that fact now. Everyone’s quietly gone back to their normal human lives, except…

…have you ever been in the middle of a meal and suddenly, your mouth is full of stars?

Reina nearly spits out her mouthful of egg and broth but catches herself just in time; she looks around to see if anyone noticed, and decides no one did. The restaurant is a comfortable red-brown dimness, the smell of food and the hubbub of voices stirring and jabbing at the air, and it’s about as Earth of a place as you can get, but for a moment, in her mouth, blue and cool and otherworldly… a silvery singing taste that is unmistakably, once you’ve tasted it, a mouthful of a galaxy.

She eats more slowly after that.

5th period, saturated with boredom, Nagumo taps his pencil against the edge of the desk and taps his feet against the ground and thinks about a planet without school. School is just an Earth thing. It's so dumb. Why should he have to be here? Up on the blackboard is a diagram of this planet’s tectonic plates and their motion; he thinks longingly of volcanoes, of an orange-ash sky, the magma flows like rivers and the ground glowingly cracked. Burn, he thinks, the name a comforting pulse in his head, burn burn burn, and his pencil taps to the rhythm of red-hot meteors piercing the ground.

It snows one night, a record-breaking depth, and the world the next morning is sculpted in glittering white, icicles hanging like claws from branches. Suzuno's steps slow as he trudges through the snow in the boots he shouldn't need; his breath mists sparkling in the air and he thinks of diamond dust. Something about this is familiar to his bones; his reflection catching in the icicles, the cold air stinging and singing on his bare skin. The world seems foreign to itself, ordinary landmarks made strange with the ice, and he wishes it were always this way; this cold quiet landscape feels more like home to him than the human life he lives in.

Walking back one evening after practice, the winter sky spangled and dotted with home, their fingers brushing, Hiroto quietly says, I think I want to kiss you, and Midorikawa tilts his head inward and says, You mean, like humans do?

Like humans do, agrees Hiroto against his nose and mouth, and then there’s the birth of a star in the cold air of that night.

(Kariya will grow up in a home with stardust piled in the corners, galaxies lagging in his footsteps when his mind wanders. My dads are aliens, he’ll say when he’s feeling particularly bold, and he will say it with unshakable certainty every time.)

True, perhaps, they weren’t aliens themselves. They were born on Earth, citizens of it by birth, a product of this planet—but the Aliea meteorite was anything but. This is well-documented fact. There are science reports and news articles to back up that yes, this rock that smashed into the side of Mt. Fuji years ago was extraterrestrial in origin, that it contained unknown chemical compounds, possibly signs of another form of life. And this is what they took into their bodies, inhaled the dust of, ground into their morning cereal like sparkling purple sugar. They took it into their bodies and their bodies built it into themselves, into the cells of their muscles and bones; gave them extraterrestrial strength. They are made partly of stardust now. Can they be denied a connection to the universe outside of Earth? Is it not natural for that newly celestial part of them to want to return home?

Remember when we were aliens? It's always that, never pretended or played at or said we were, and this will not change even when they grow up into the mundane adult world and leave the realm of children’s fantasy behind. Remember when we were, for a short time, aliens? Remember when we burst the bounds of these weak human bodies and took to space, dancing among the stars, breathing nebula dust? High above all those humans confined to their single wet sphere, laughing at their limitations, do you remember, do you remember—

Reina grew lethargic and low on energy after the Aliea incident was all over. That should have been a warning to the rest of them. Without the adrenaline of the FFI, there is nothing to keep them going through the withdrawal from the meteorite, and in the weeks afterward they all begin to fall. Hiroto, who burned himself out the hardest pushing all the way to finals, bows out first, complaining of nausea during practice; Midorikawa, Nagumo and Haruya follow suit. Dizziness, chest tightness, violent trembling. Not as fast or as strong as they were before it all happened. The Aliea meteorite pushed their bodies past the limit of human ability, straining their hearts and lungs and muscles to the utmost, and now they must pay the price.

Saginuma holds out the longest, gritting his teeth through the shooting cramps and the lightheadedness, until one day during practice the world goes liquid and the next thing he sees is the ceiling of a hospital room, lit by the sunset of several hours later. Whispers come from the other side of the door. Unethical. Beyond unethical, even… could have killed them if he kept it up… bound to be adverse effects, and yet he… children, barely teenagers… A doctor comes into the room and tells him the same thing Saginuma knows he told the others; absolutely no sports or major exertion until full recovery, which will take months. Maybe even years. Here is a list of medications and dietary needs until then. Saginuma closes his eyes, drifts off, and dreams of sitting on a comet travelling away from Earth, the electric blue tail arcing behind him, headed home. Heading home.

Where is home? They are all orphans, abandoned children left stranded and exposed on the face of an uncaring planet. Searching for somewhere to belong—sitting under the stars, pointing up at the night sky, at the gaps in constellations, at the spaces where planets would be. Hey, do you think I came from there? Or that star, there! No place has ever claimed them that could prove them wrong. Might as well be aliens. Might as well claim ancestry from another world.

Spring on Earth, a straggling group of high schoolers walking out of the stadium. Flush with the thrill of watching a game instead of playing in it, debating what they’d have done differently in each player’s position. But you know, says Midorikawa, caught up in the flow of conversation, Earth has a saying—

Endou nudges him. Hey, hey, you’re not an alien anymore, remember? You’re from Earth yourself!

Somewhere far overhead, hidden behind the daylight, a shooting star flashes across the sky.

Oh, says Midorikawa, and laughs. You’re right, I forgot.

X is shaken awake in the middle of the night, roughly enough to pop the recharging cable from its socket at the base of his neck, hands grabbing him and rolling him hard onto his back.

The force, the brusqueness of motion, is intimately familiar to him, as is the hair brushing his face. "Zero?" he asks, and tries to rub at his eyes with his hand, only to have his wrist wrenched away.

"Eyes," comes Zero's muttered voice from above him. "Two of them. Hands -" A hand runs down his arm, finds the fingers at the end, squeezes too hard. Zero's breath is coming harsh and rough and audible. "Two of them. Ten fingers.” His hand scrabbles over X's chest. "Intact -" He's clearly talking more to himself than anything else, clenched teeth under his breath, a reassurance that what he's seeing and feeling is real. "Okay. Good. All right."

The presence above him pulls back and vanishes.

X sits up, no longer groggy, and says to Zero's hurriedly retreating figure, "Nightmare?"

Zero nods, a single curt movement, then reaches for the door.

"Stay a bit," protests X; Zero is trembling, breathing hard and fast to cool off a clearly overheated system. He's in a terrible state. "Don't leave so fast -"

He gets up, reaches out a hand, and Zero spins around, teeth bared. “Stay away from me.”

Oh. The second part of what Zero must have been dreaming about clicks into place, and X's hand drops to his side.

“It’ll all right -” he begins, moving to get up, and Zero bristles. He decides to stay where he is. “It’s all right. I’m not going -” He bites his tongue, amends the reflexive reassurance to fit the situation. “You’re not going to hurt me. It’s fine.”

Zero, tense and frozen, doesn’t move. The dim light from the socket of the recharger bed reflects off the lens inside his eye, the pupil shining like a cat’s.

“Do you want to hurt me?”

A vigorous shake of the head.

“Then you won’t. It’s fine.” X tries to speak calmly, softly. “It was a dream, it wasn’t real, you’re awake now and you’re not going to hurt me.”

Slowly, very slowly, as though making a deliberate effort, Zero lets himself relax.

“Do you want to come back here?”

Zero moves back toward him as though deep underwater. X has to repeat, “I know you’re not going to hurt me.”

“Sometimes I wish you didn’t trust me so much,” murmurs Zero, rough and raw and aching, and X’s heart breaks a little upon hearing that; he reaches out and takes Zero’s hand, which he’s now close enough to do.

“They’re just dreams,” he says, soothingly. “You won’t hurt me. You don’t want to, so you won’t. Right?”

Zero sits slowly down next to X, lets himself be drawn into X’s arms. He’s still trembling.

The light from the recharger bed pulses softly in the dark.

“I keep seeing it,” says Zero hollowly, at length. “All the ways -” His voice breaks off as though swallowed in on itself. “I keep seeing myself hurting you. Killing you. Torturing you.” The trembling intensifies. “I don’t - I’d never do that. I’d never do that to you. But I keep seeing it. It makes me sick. I wake up and it’s -” His voice chokes off again.

All X can do is hold him, and rub his back as gently as he can.

Wait, comes the thought; maybe… maybe that’s not all he can do.

He pulls away enough to make eye contact with Zero.

“Do you want me,” he says, before he can think too much about the absurdity of what he’s asking, “to interface with you? I could try to get in there, smooth things over a little -”

Zero has gone still.

“Sorry, I know that’s too personal,” says X, feeling his face grow warm and flustered, “never mind, I -”

“No,” says Zero, “no, it’s all right,” and his hand comes up to cup X’s face, pulling him in.

X kisses him first before he does anything else, a soft and lingering contact, then breaks away in order to pull Zero in and press the crystals on their foreheads together.

He doesn’t know what he was expecting, but in the intuitive way, devoid of sight or sound, that these things happen, a menu presents itself. Would he like to access any of the following recipients?: DWN-∞. Of course there isn’t any other option on the menu. He hits the button that will let him into Zero’s soul, breathless with the anticipation -

- and is met with a password screen.

As it turns out here are several layers of passwords to get through, each dozens of digits long, each practically uncrackable. Zero unlocks each one for him, opening all the doors before him - silently letting him in. X takes a breath before slipping through the last one, and -

Zero’s mind, the entirety of it, makes shivering contact with his.

If they were human he might compare it to reaching through someone’s ribs and touching the quick-beating heart. Distantly, in his own body, he hears himself gasp, feels Zero’s fingers tighten on his shoulders. Sharp, rough, swirling with subdued intensity - this is Zero, this is the thrum of his thoughts and his essence laid bare before him. He can feel what Zero is feeling - feel his own hands on the back of the neck. It’s dizzying. It’s electrifying, almost overwhelming. They could remain like this for hours, souls pressed together, breathing each other in.

But he came here for a reason. A sprawling forest of code, labyrinths upon labyrinths, the infinitely complex connections from part to part that can create something as subtle and multilayered as a soul - X pinpoints where the memory centers are as best as he can and heads there. Looming in the background, impossible to ignore, is a fortress of firewalls, locked and double-locked; the crawling seething mass of glitched data, of virus, remains quarantined behind there; not fixed, simply unable to keep spreading. Zero has to live with that pressure at the back of his mind every day of his life -

X stops by there, throws a few extra chains of code around it, adds a few more locks. Zero snorts. Won’t change much.

I’m trying to be helpful. X is up near the memory centers; a vast and swirling archive of information, detail, emotion, every thing that Zero has experienced that he can remember. He’s deep inside Zero’s soul now, far deeper than a more normal antivirus or troubleshooting probe would go; it’s a feeling similar to ears popping, although not entirely unpleasant. The pressure of Zero’s very being is warm and comfortable around him.

I like feeling you here too, replies Zero; of course he heard X’s thoughts, as much as X can hear his. Zero thinks X’s soul is calming, oceanlike in its reserves of compassion, the depths of it troubled with conflict. The thought darts across the landscape of Zero’s mind that he doesn’t deserve someone this compassionate; X responds with the thought and sensation of a silencing kiss. He can’t do it physically; to even move would completely shatter his focus.

So, the memory banks. This is the infinitely tricky boundary between programming and telepathy; the kind of thing where if you think too hard about what you’re doing - if you look down off the tightrope - everything falls apart. X dimly thinks, or feels, that inserting his entire being into Zero’s own memory banks would be disastrous; that Zero would be unable to handle having two lifetimes’ worth of memories in his head and might simply overload. So he extends a probe of questing concentration instead, pushing through Zero’s life experiences, feeling glimpses of sight and sound brush past.

In the center of Zero’s memory, like the eye of a storm - or maybe trailing from its underbelly, like threads from behind embroidery - or any number of things in the shapeless space they inhabit - are the tangled-together swirls of thought that manifest in dreams, and X drifts among them, feeling the way they snarl together. Memories of being with friends intertwine with memories of killing; the knowledge of the virus inside him stains memories of daily life; and always there is X, his bond with X, his love for X, tangled together with the thread I am dangerous. I hurt. I kill.

No wonder he’s been having nightmares.

So X undoes the tangles as well as he can. He sorts the positive memories together and the negative memories together, keeps them well clear of each other, and among the threads of Zero’s conviction that he is dangerous he leaves a memory of laughing together with Zero, carefree and happy, like a kiss pressed to a bruise. Then he withdraws, with a feeling like slowly coming up to the surface of deep water, slowly ascending from the dark and quiet deep to air and reality once more.

He blinks. Zero blinks.

The light of the recharger bed pulses a gently blue in the low-lit dark; the room is soft and solid all around them in the quiet.

“Are you feeling better?” he asks. The connection between them seems to have shut itself off as he pulled out; everything feels frighteningly cold and lonely without Zero’s presence entwined with his.

“I think,” says Zero slowly. “Let me run diagnostics…”

There’s a pause while his eyes grow unfocused; after a while he blinks and his gaze clears. “There’s been extra defragmentation done,” he says. “In the memory storage overflow.”

“Oh,” murmurs X, “is that what I was doing?” He feels very tired, all of a sudden. It took a lot of focus to do... all that.

Zero’s arms go around him, firm, supporting; the shaking has stopped. “You should sleep.” More quietly he adds, “I woke you up. Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” X yawns, and catches Zero’s wrist. “You should sleep too.”

Zero hesitates. “You mean - here?”

“If you want.” The memory of how it felt to be inside Zero’s core, warm and secure, lingers in his mind; falling asleep beside him sounds like a reasonable facsimile thereof. And he hasn’t entirely forgotten how wild and haunted Zero looked ten minutes ago, and the instinct of comfort that came with that.

Zero hesitates for a long time, body tense. X has to add, “You won’t hurt me. It’ll be fine.”

“I know,” says Zero, and finally settles in beside X, catlike in the slowness and deliberation with which he lies down and makes himself comfortable. X, in some relief, rummages for the backup cord and plugs it in at the back of Zero’s neck; Zero returns the favor, his touch warm and soft. He is only ever soft like this around X…

X rearranges himself, gets an arm around Zero, feels him settle into the touch. “Good night,” he says, “sweet dreams.”

“I’m sure they will be,” murmurs Zero, and closes his eyes, and X follows suit.

Consciousness blurred back in, slowly, as though with great effort.  As though he had been at the bottom of a deep, dark, well, for a very long time.

There was a voice in his ears.  He opened his eyes, saw Dr. Cain standing above him, mouth moving -  but he couldn't understand anything.  It was nothing more than muffled garble, like hearing something from another room.

Fear set in, then turned to into a formless panic.  He opened his mouth and a strange string of noise came out; he had the feeling he was supposed to be giving it some sort of shape, but what...

Then there was a sensation like resurfacing, something breaking through into clear air, and he could hear properly again.  Dr. Cain was saying, "X, can you understand me?  Do you understand what I'm saying?"

"I do now," said X.  "What was that?"

Dr. Cain ignored the question.  “Can you sit up?”

His limbs wouldn’t obey him for a moment, then they did.  “Yes.”

“All right.  Walk to the door and back for me.”

He did so, slipping off the repair table and making his difficult way to the door of the lab.  Walking was a struggle, at first, but as his body remembered how to move it was as though he’d been ice-frozen and was now thawing.  “Good,” said Dr. Cain.  “All in order, I think.”

X sat gingerly back down on the repair table, his mind slowly clearing enough for a question to form out of the tangle of confusion.  “What happened?  Shouldn’t I be dead?”  Zero had shot him in the head, point-blank… that should have killed him.  There should have been no escaping that.

“You should,” said Dr. Cain wearily.  “But you were very lucky.  The shot passed through at such an angle that it only took out your language and movement centers, which can be replaced, and a corner of your memory bank that stores information categorized insignificant.  A few degrees of difference and there’d be no bringing you back.”  He stroked his beard, troubled.  “You’re very lucky to be alive.”

X considered that.  There seemed to be a chill against his back, as though death had been close enough to brush against him.  “I am.”  He hesitated.  “Thank you for repairing me.”

“You don’t have to thank me.  I have a duty to you and to humanity to ensure that you’re working properly.”  Dr. Cain’s gaze was distant; a frown hovered on his face.  At length he said, “X…”

X tensed at his tone.  “What?”

“The shot was fired at point-blank range,” said Dr. Cain.  “All Maverick Hunters are under strict orders not to approach Zero unless absolutely necessary.  What happened?”

X’s gut tightened, and his hands knotted together.  There were any number of things he could say - He snuck up on me… I thought he was unconscious… A strut gave way and I fell into his range…

“I kissed him,” he said.

Dr. Cain’s face went wide with shock.  “You… you kissed him?”

“I did.”

“Well… well I’ll be.” Dr. Cain sat down, as though his legs had given out.  “You really…”

“On the mouth,” confirmed X miserably.  “And then he shot me.”

The white-light shock slowly gave way to something quieter - worry, exasperation, and sympathy all melted together.  “Oh, X,” sighed Dr. Cain, “oh, X.”

X stared down at his hands, tightly knotted in his lap.  His throat felt tight.

“You’re so young,” said Dr. Cain.  X opened his mouth to point out that he was by far the oldest of his kind, but Dr. Cain held up a hand.  “You have a much more complex development process to go through than the other reploids, and you’re still nowhere near done with it.  Take it from this old man who’s nearing the end of his days… robot or not, you’re very young.”

There was nothing X could say to that.

“I know it must be hard for you,” said Dr. Cain gently.  “Being the only true specimen like you, with your creator long dead.  I know a little of how lonely and lost you are.  And I know Zero must be feeling some way similar.”

“Right,” said X, through the lump in his throat, “and that was why -”

“But regardless of how he feels,” persisted Dr. Cain, “he’s highly dangerous.  I can understand that you’re drawn to him, that you sympathize with him, and I truly admire your depth of empathy for it.  But you can’t let that override your sense of self-preservation, or for that matter your duties as a protector of humanity.  You reached out to him, and he nearly killed you.”

He kissed me back first.  X’s hands balled into fists; some part of him was determined not to admit to this, not to share this one part of what had happened in that warehouse.  He kissed me back fierce and desperate like the rest of him, holding onto me as though he was just as lonely as I am, as though we were the only two things in this world that could possibly fit together, and then he pushed me away as though something inside of him was tearing in two and -

“I understand.”  His vision was blurring now, his voice thick.

“Oh, X,” sighed Dr. Cain again, and stood up.  “Do you want a hug?”

X nodded.  Dr. Cain wrapped his arms around him, and X leaned into the embrace of the closest thing he had to a father and returned the hug.  Humans were so soft.

“Can’t we do anything to help him?” he asked, his voice muffled into Dr. Cain’s shoulder, and Dr. Cain sighed and pulled away just enough to meet his eyes.

“It’s doubtful,” he said.  “There might be ways… but the priority will always be to contain and neutralize the threat he poses, and to stop him from killing more people than he already has.  With our hands full with that, trying to make him feel better takes quite a backseat, you understand.”

X understood all too well, and he also understood that Zero’s threat level was by now ramped up to red.  Lethal force recommended.  Saving the world from him would mean they’d kill him, just flat-out kill him, and he’d never have a chance to, to -

He wiped at his eyes and found his hands wet.

“Your capacity for love and compassion is infinitely admirable,” said Dr. Cain sympathetically, and handed him a tissue.  “But at times like this I worry it hurts you more than it helps you.  Try to focus on all the lives that are in the balance.  Those matter more than Zero’s feelings, certainly.”

It made sense.  It made all too much sense.

He kissed me back and there was longing in it.

"She what?"

The outburst that issued from the office of Sub-Commander Tenjouin that morning was something everyone had been waiting for. Ever since the report had been tossed across the desk of a hapless Osiris Red, the unit as a whole had been putting off informing him of the occurrence. And now, it seemed, the moment had arrived.

"My baby sister has vanished?"

"Sir, she is a grown woman, quite capable of fending for herself -"

"Has anyone been trying to find her?"

"Yes, actually, she's considered criminally on the run, she needs to be captured and brought in -"

"Wh -" Tenjouin paused, blinked for a moment. "Well don't capture her, for god's sake, I just need to know she's safe, all right?"

“All right. Sir.” His deputy hesitated for a moment, trying to determine if this could be considered an official order. If so, Tenjouin might have to be court-martialed, perhaps even brought before the Professor, for breaking procedure out of flagrant favoritism - but then again, people tended to tolerate his eccentricities. He was, after all, a brilliant duelist and strategist, and demoting him would mean a loss of valuable contribution.

The deputy made a mental note to tell the rest of the unit to bring her in unharmed.

“Anything else?”

“Yes, sir. Apparently Marufuji has gone rogue again.”

Tenjouin sighed and dropped back into his chair. “Again?”

“Yes, sir. Again.”

It wasn’t the first time, or even the second, or third. Marufuji had a tendency to buck orders, ditch his squadron, and go on what could be described as a rampage if not for how very deliberate it clearly was. He tended to get off easy because those episodes did, after all, deal significant and strategically useful damage to the Resistance forces. And there was a rumor that increasing his penalty each time wouldn’t deter him at all, because said punishments tended to be corporeal, and, well -

Tenjouin rubbed his eyes. “All right, bring him in for questioning. Use caution, all that. If I know him -” He stopped with his mouth open, blinked a couple times; a look of puzzlement passed over his face. “Well, anyway. He has a tendency to be pretty unreasonable during those times, from - from what I’ve heard. Got that?”

“Yes, sir.” Nothing he couldn’t have inferred himself, but Tenjouin seemed distracted now, a look of mild confusion on his face. “I… I think that’s all, sir.”

“Good.” Tenjouin appeared to shake himself out of it. “Make sure Asuka-chan gets back safe, all right?”

Asuka-chan. No one in their right mind would refer to a fellow soldier that way in an official context, regardless of familial relationship, but there was a rumor that Tenjouin had once fallen into a gap between dimensions and it had turned him a bit odd in the head. Fairytales, like the superstition that the Real Solid Vision testing facility was built on top of a haunted abandoned dorm. "Yes, sir."

"Is that all?" asked Tenjouin.

The deputy had work to be doing. “Yes, sir, that's all."

He's just finished signing autographs, a little flourish on the end of each one, greeting each comer as sincerely and openly as he can with the tiredness of a long day of public appearance tugging at him, when he hears his name being called in a way that cuts through the noise around him.

"Robin!"  Tsukumo Yuuma is pushing his way through the dispersing remains of the crowd, all bright voice and loud colors.  "It's been a while!"

"Would you like an autograph?" is Fuuya's first reaction, followed by "Sorry!" - as Yuuma's expression starts to turn towards bewilderment.  "I've been signing autographs for the past ten minutes.  It's automatic.  Were you there for the show?"

"The exhibition duel?  Yeah, it was great!"  Yuuma bounces a little on his heels.  "You're really cool, Robin!"

Sparrow wings fluttering in Fuuya's chest.  Yuuma tends to have this effect.  "Ah, thank you."

Yuuma eyes the rapidly emptying square around them.  "Listen, Fuuya...”

Sparrow heart skips a beat at the sound of his given name.  "Yes?"

"I have this friend, Astral.  He can't be here in person, but he's a huge fan of yours and wanted me to tell you that."

No matter how many times Fuuya hears something along those lines, the warmth that fills his heart is always the same.  "Ah, I'm glad!"

"Yeah, he thinks your duels are really cool, that they have this kind of, I don't know, he's too poetic for me a lot of the time, but that they're pretty -"  He cuts himself off.  His gaze flicks to the right corner of his eye.  "Elegant, yeah, that was it.  And a bunch of other stuff, I don't remember, but anyway he really likes you!"  Yuuma takes Fuuya's hands, and Fuuya's chest that is already warm from the compliments starts to bubble like water in a pot.  "And all that stuff he said, I think so too!"

"R-Really," murmurs Fuuya, face warm, staring down at Yuuma's hands.  They are squareish and firm and certain around his own shy slender fingers.  "I - I'm glad."

"And Astral, this friend, he gave me something," says Yuuma, and Fuuya looks up to see him leaning in, flushed with a secret anticipation, "and told me to give it to you."

"That's really nice of him," says Fuuya, too flustered by Yuuma's closeness, his typical exuberant personal space invasion, the shining in his eyes.  "What is it -"

"First," says Yuuma, and gently pries the mask off Fuuya's face, and lets his hair fall down over his forehead.  "Did you know your hair looks so soft like that..."

and somewhere in all this Fuuya realizes what the present is, and thank god he has time to relax into the feeling of Yuuma's lips pressing gently against his, eyes drift shut, sparrow wings beating hard in his chest.  Yuuma's lips are warm like the rest of him and Fuuya is forgetting to breathe.

He remembers only when Yuuma pulls away, the smile on his face bright and a little uncertain.  "That was the present," he says.

Fuuya giggles because he doesn't know what to do, and because the warmth in his chest is bubbling over too much to be contained.  "That was," he says, "a very good present -"

Yuuma lets out a breath.  "Good!"

"- do you think he'll ever be able to come over so I can pay him back personally?"  He feels almost too daring saying that.  ESPer Robin, he tells himself, ESPer Robin is brave and bold enough for those kinds of things, with Tsukumo Yuuma shining in his face and Yuuma's friend - friend? - a ghost on his lips.  Even without the mask, with his hair soft in his face, he is still Robin.

"No, sorry," says Yuuma.  He's still holding Fuuya's hands, and he swings them from side to side a little.  "It's hard to explain.  But -"

"In that case - " says Fuuya, who is ESPer Robin who is brave enough for this, and leans in and kisses Yuuma, gentle and sweet, and savors the tiny noise of pleased surprise against his mouth.  "You can give him that, from me, okay?"

The slow smile that spreads across Yuuma's face at that tells him he's gotten the right idea.  "I will!" he says.  "I'll be sure to," his hand comes up and touches his mouth, "tell him it's from you, and -"

"You don't have to if you don't want to," says Fuuya, almost coyly, just to see the way Yuuma's face is like a light brightening under a blanket, secret soft at the understanding.  He adds, "But I would appreciate it."

"Thanks!" says Yuuma, almost stuttering, too-bright and flustered.  "Thanks, I -" There's a beeping from his pocket.

"Ah!" he says, and pulls out his D-Gazer, and checks the screen with fumbling fingers.  "I have to go now -"

"Bye," says Fuuya, a tentative hand raised waving goodbye, and Yuuma who is already halfway across the square turns around and shouts, "Later!  Hang on -"  He skids to a stop, draws one arm back, and ESPer Robin's mask comes pinwheeling through the air towards Fuuya like a shuriken.  Fuuya catches it and waves as Yuuma disappears.

It's not until he's back in his dressing room that he allows himself to put his face in his hands and emit the continuous high-pitched noise into them that's been building up in his chest.  He slides down the wall and ends up sitting on his cape.  He's kissed Tsukumo Yuuma.  And Yuuma likes him and Yuuma's friend-loved-one who sounds so nice and eloquent likes him and...

can you kiss a spirit, thinks yugi, can you kiss a ghost that doesn't really exist but for a memory locked into ancient cursed gold and sometimes freed into a borrowed-shared-hallowed vessel of flesh - can you kiss him.

he thinks he would like to.

the spirit's face is like a reflection and yugi can see through his eyes to the stars outside the window.  he looks pensive, lonely, worn down with a quiet melancholy. the edges of him are like smoke.

can you kiss a spirit. can you kiss the sadness off the corners of his mouth  - yugi would like to.

he is very beautiful, and yugi doesn't know who he is any more than the spirit knows who he himself is, but he knows him.  knows the fierce wild loyalty, the quick impulsiveness, the pride and strength. knows too the fear, the loneliness, the feeling of being stranded on a single point in time with no memories to build a bridge to the past.

- knows the trust and love in his voice when he calls him partner, the often-hidden gentleness that settles in when they talk face-to-face in the corridor between their soul rooms and yugi wants very much to kiss him, except that those moments are more dream than real and can you kiss a dream -

if you're feeling sad, says yugi, into the stillness of the room, I'm here. you can talk to me.

the sprit turns too look at him.  thank you, he says. hesitates, uncharacteristically.

(his familiar bangs cast shadows over his face and yugi wants to cross the bed and brush them aside, wipe away the tears that he knows remain unshed only through force of will.)

i don't know who i am, says the spirit, and his voice that is normally a little too loud for the occasion sounds small and lost.  i don't -

it's not something he thinks about often, yugi knows (through the tugging dancing link between their minds), it is usually buried beneath the quick and fiery nature of the spirit's thoughts, but times like these. when it is nighttime and the house is quiet and cold.

i know who you are, says yugi, and then says, i know you.

the spirit stares at him, his expression incomprehensible.

i know that's not enough, says yugi, his words shivery and nervous off his tongue. not for now. but someday you'll remember everything about who you are, and until then i'm here. and the person you are now is, is - there's nothing to worry about.

the spirit stares a moment more and then smiles. it's small and gentle and it shines in the dark room, it's beautiful and yugi wants to taste it. he wants to feel that smile against his, warm breath on warm breath, but that's not quite right because spirits have no breath.

he reaches forward and touches the spirit's hand. it feels odd, it tingles, like something is there and yet not quite there. if he pushes, his hand passes right through.

you can touch a spirit, just a bit. not very much.

can i kiss you? asks yugi.

the spirit's mouth opens a little bit. he really is very beautiful; it's not quite his own face that yugi sees mirrored back at him. there is a regal grace, a sort of poise and solemnity that marks the difference between them. they look like different people.

yes, says the spirit, in a voice like eyes widening, and yugi slides forward and brings his lips to where the vision's mouth is, feels the otherworldly pinpricks on his mouth. feels them shift softly as the spirit tilts his head and presses into the half-touch. feels it elsewhere, too, as ghostly hands slide onto his shoulders, the back of his neck, gentle static combing through his hair.

yugi moves away and sees wide violet eyes staring at him, he can still see the stars through them, like a reflection.

i'm here, he says again.

i know, says the spirit, and the goosebumps move to his face, a soft touch that feels warmer this time.