Work Text:
You didn’t expect to find him awake at this hour. Not him, nor anyone.
Artificial light sharpens the angularity of his features, his blade-like gaze. The shadows bring out the acuity of those eyes, catching on slender wrists. Beneath that wiry frame is all steel, you know. Nothing like your smoke and mirrors, your sleight of hand.
If there’s anyone who can carve past your façade, it’s him.
(Maybe that’s why you can’t bring yourself to leave. You want someone to see you for you. You live each day you have left like you’re dying. What more do you have to lose?
There’s a reason why you don’t turn your back to Kai, squint at the frying pan in his hand with a wary eye. Feel a phantom ache throb at your temples, pulse at your brow.)
Kai doesn’t look up. He can’t tear his eyes away from his work, but the corner of his mouth twitches. Like the notion of you being able to sneak up on him is amusing. Ouch.
The swift, practiced sound of the knife thud, thud, thudding against the cutting board fills the silence. When he speaks, it’s with a low, velvet voice. Calm as ever.
“Oh, hello. Pardon the mess -- I hadn’t expected company.”
“S’fine.” You mutter. There aren’t any chairs here, so you peer over Kai’s shoulder to see what he’s cooking up.
(… Can’t be smacked with a frying pan if it’s in use, right? It’d be a sin to waste food that’s smelling this good already, and Kai seemed like he took pride in his craft.)
Bacon, arranged evenly across the cutting board… So evenly sliced. Kai made it more than just a meal: he made cooking an art . You wonder if whoever ate his meals felt bad for taking that apart. Treasured each bite all the more, for all the for the care put into each part.
Lucky them. Your mother could burn water, while your father was hardly ever home. Always halfway across the world, always too busy to give his son a call.
(Guess corporate meetings took too much of his time. Never a family man, eh? You don’t hate him for it.
Hard to feel much towards a stranger.)
“So. What’s on the menu tonight?”
Kai sets down the knife, and you can breathe a little easier. Smiles the same smile he always does: bland and polite. Says: “Lend a hand, and you’ll soon find out.”
“...My cooking skills are limited to the microwave. You sure you want me to…?”
“Hm. I have always wanted to teach another my craft...”
So that’s a yes, then. At least Kai knows what he’s getting himself into.
“Alright. Let us begin. Or should I say -- let’s get cracking?”
You stare at him blankly for a moment. Was that -- you eye the carton of eggs beside the stove -- a pun? Who knew the stoic, self-proclaimed house husband was capable of humor?
“Can’t say I’m shell-shocked at the situation at hand, with all that’s transpired.”
You play along. It’s… nice, to be able to joke around like this. You try to convince yourself it’s because you want to be on the chef’s good side. Who knew what he could slip in his cooking, without you watching?
(… If he was planning on poison, though, he wouldn’t have asked you to help.)
Kai directs you towards a glass mixing bowl. Tells you to follow his example, cracking an egg on the bowl’s edge. Swaps the yolk and egg white from between the two eggshell halves, back and forth, back and forth until he’s left with only the yolk. Plops it into the bowl in a single, fluid motion.
Kai makes it look easy. Effortless. To a person who’s never gotten their hands dirty, something so simple is an impressive feat.
… Why are you here, anyway? Kai could have gotten this done in half the time.
What’s left behind is discarded. Empty eggshells are useless. Just like --
“Why don’t you give it a try?”
“...I think that’s enough eggcitement for me, actually.”
“Oh, no,” Kai’s voice is polite, but there’s an unbending quality to it. Solid as stone, and just as unyielding. “I insist.”
You got yourself into this situation. Guess there’s no backing out now.
“Okay, okay.” You have a bad feeling about this. Then again, nearly everything in your life is preceded by a feeling of foreboding. “Here goes.”
You take an egg. Try to crack it on the bowl’s edge, but fail to make a dent. Try again, harder. Again --
You crack the egg. Just… not into the bowl.
Because you have the physical strength of an uncooked ramen noodle, and use that measly strength with a just as pathetic frequency, you misjudge. Badly.
Splat! Goes the egg yolk. Right. Onto. The. Floor.
“Ah… Haha. Hahaha!”
Oh, so Kai thinks this is funny, huh? … Hold up. You don’t think you’ve ever heard him laugh like that before -- amusement bright in his dark eyes, covering his mouth with a calloused hand. Bent double from silent mirth, shoulders shaking before breaking into airy chuckles.
… You can’t really say it sounds anything like anything you’ve heard before. Nothing as poetic as bells, sure, but it’s contagious enough to make you do the same.
“Hey. It’s… ahaha… not that bad, right? Surely… it wasn’t always a piece of, heh, cake for you…?”
Ridiculous, you think, rolling your eyes. Kai can dish out (heh) pun after pun with such deadpan delivery. You could die tomorrow, and yet… you can’t stop laughing. You try to bury your smile into the folds of your scarf, but who are you trying to fool?
You and Kai are the only ones up at this hour. Here, no eyes will unravel your layers one by one, so you don’t have to resist the urge to bury your face in your scarf. No accusations sizzle through your teeth, sparking at your skin.
You’re fresh out of ammunition, see, and you don’t feel like pulling the trigger. Too drained to go riling someone up, at least. Slotting inflammatory phrases between your teeth, firing the gun and watching the sparks fly — well. It'd be a shame for such polite company to go up in flames.
So you don’t talk about how your lives are on the line. You don’t think you can stomach that thought.
Not now, when eggs start simmering in the pot and you watch as Kai carefully spoons sizzling butter into a separate bowl of eggs so meticulously, it’s like he’s handling liquid nitrogen. Then again, such a volatile substance could never smell this good.
(...You’re being paranoid again, but hey. Caution wasn’t the culprit in killing the cat; it was curiosity.)
Angels could sing about that gentle aroma, good enough to almost make you forget the knives on the counter.
(Kai could kill you, easy. You’ve seen him move like a nocked arrow, tensed and poised at your jugular and soaring just as quicksilver swift. A blade poised at your throbbing carotid and it’d be game over.
Haha. You never thought you’d get this far. It haunts you, those four syllables.
Zero percent.
The first time you saw that dreaded number, it blazed like a brand in your eyes, leaving them watering. Left your words hanging in the air. Felt heat slither over your skin like you’d caught a glimpse of your ashes, a chill crawl down your spine like you’d walked over your grave.
That chill haunts your mornings as you wake, wears the name of a ghost. A name you’ve stolen to save your skin. You dare not speak it now, but whisper it into its folds as you wind his scarf around your face.
It’s the warmest piece of clothing you own, even if it’s fraying at the edges -- you can’t seem to let it go. Winter dares not do you part, it seems.
Stubborn as always, that man. Seems like he haunts you even now.)
“For the Hollandaise,” Kai is saying, whisking you out of the winding corridors of convoluted memory with a wave of a spoon. He’s gesturing at the mixture of eggs and butter. You nod like you understand a word of what he’s saying. Hollandaise? Sounded extravagant. Sounded French. It was probably… seasoning? Or something.
(A silent agreement has been made: for you, cooking’s currently off-limits. Kai’s polite enough not to comment on your, ah, impressive lack of expertise. Instead, you’ve been limited to rifling through the cabinets for salt and vinegar, accepting stirring duty with a resigned sigh.
“Perhaps next time,” Kai hummed with a distant smile. Like there was a next time left for you.
Like you deserved a shred of his kindness, served up with eloquent words and all his oddities. Odd, isn’t it?
How different this is from when you spat accusations at him, even if they were tinged with truth. When he sent in Miss Nao swinging, leaving your ears ringing. Struggling to see straight, making your world a spinning haze.
Even so… a seat at the table to call your own, huh? Doesn’t sound so bad. You can’t quite call it forgiveness, but… Just this once, you will not deny him this.)
“This apron has not always been mine.”
“Wait. Really? It’s the only getup I ever see you wear. Must be important to you, huh…”
“Yes. It’s precious… The memories it holds, and all the things he taught me… they’re dear to me. Including this recipe.”
You understand. More than you’d like to admit, you think, toying idly with a stray thread from your scarf. You’ve never liked laying yourself bare. Never could stand the risk. The vulnerability. Besides, the last thing he needs is more ammunition against you.
But… just this once. It can’t hurt. Right…?
“I… knew a person like that myself. And I think… you still have a person like that. Ahaha… don’t look so surprised. We’re actually… not so different, huh? I… even now, I find myself pathetically clinging to hope… that I can keep that someone safe.”
A heavy silence. The sizzle of sliced bacon. A sigh.
Then: “You and I —- I think you’ll find we’re quite alike.”
You smile in spite of your stinging eyes, turning away. You don’t want him to see you like this.
Wondering. Thinking, in spite of it all: in another life, we might’ve been friends.
No. You turn back, eyes tracing the delicate curve of his wrists. His eyes are riveted to the stove again, too deep in focus to notice you staring.
He’s caught up in a trance… toasting the English muffins. You try not to laugh at the intensity of his stare towards such a mundane task. How he keeps tucking back stray strands behind his ear to no avail; they always fall back to frame his face. The way he huffs in annoyance, grips the spoon harder in response.
(Kai keeps surprising you. From the deadpan delivery of his puns to his quiet kindness -- there’s never a dull moment in his company.)
In another life, we could’ve been more.
At seven, you are sharpening your knives. You dislike owing your father anything, so you climb on top of the counter. You’d rather risk standing on the shelves to reach the whetstone.
You don’t fall. You can’t afford the noise, so you quiet your steps. Let all your sharp edges bleed into the black, until your steps never shout: only whisper. Still yourself into a shadow. You can’t afford to be more.
At eight, you count bones, not sheep. Ghosts seethe at the foot of your bed, filling your mind with fog. You tell yourself you are dreaming.
Dead men tell no tales, after all. Fabrications of the fragmented mind. Father would hear the screams. They’re not real, he would say with a hand in your hair, and for a moment you could almost call him kind.
You calm yourself by counting, instead, because you know the aftertaste of that lie will only ever be bittersweet. Fumble for an anchor, filling the sea of silence with the monotony of your voice until they fade.
One and two and three and four: metacarpal by metacarpal, rib by rib. Methodical: cervical, lumbar, thoracic, sacrum, coccyx.
Recall: just the amount of pressure to snap a wrist. You always flinch at the noise. At nine, you don’t even blink.
At nineteen, you close your eyes. Look away.
It’s all you can ever do.
/ /
At twenty-something, you’re still sharpening your knives.
There’s hardly any point in keeping track. It’s not like anyone ever celebrated your birthdays with candles and cake, so they always left you with the strangest ache.
You felt it on a mission: watching a child holding his father’s hand, crossing the crowded streets with matching grins. A pain called longing, a dull ache in your chest.
Mr. Chidouin was the closest thing you’ve had to a father. Sometimes, when he guided you through another recipe with hands warm and grin wider than any smile you’d seen, you could almost forget that ache.
When you close your eyes, you can’t forget your ill-spent youth. A thicket filled with blight, infected with blades. You leave them unsheathed. Wandering the winding alleyways of an old adversary’s territory unarmed? It’s asking to be eaten in a den of wolves.
You dare not wear any color, there. The shadows sink their teeth into your skin, steep your soul in tar, tarnishing you with their taint. The shadows swallow you whole, and you let them.
You are nothing if you are not used. A blade to be wielded. Disposable, once you’ve shown your hand, made your blood-soaked gambit and left your ghosts behind. A gleam of silver in the dark. A parting gift for your marks before they go -- it’s only polite.)
You can’t afford to be careless. It’s different, now that you have someone to protect. When you first encountered your charge, it was a golden morning.
You slept in shadows. Startled awake when you heard a voice.
A child’s voice. “Mister, who are you? Do you work for my dad?”
A miscalculation on your part. You’d stayed up all night tracking down a target for the organization and drifted off several steps outside of the kitchen. You fell asleep while standing, which was not unusual for your occupation -- at times, it was a necessity. You desperately tried to mitigate the damage, turning away so she couldn’t see your face.
“Something like that. I, ah… I was hired to assist in cooking.”
“Dad taught you Mom’s recipe, right? I knew it. It hasn’t tasted the same, lately. Tastes good, but… different.”
How astute. A sharp one, this child. But -- enough of this.
“Try to forget about me, alright? Nothing good comes from knowing me. It is... safer that way.”
“Mister Shadow, will I see you again? You’ve got to teach me someday. Promise.”
“I --” Just as stubborn as her father, that one. She had bulldozed over your protests, cut straight to the point.
Footsteps in the hall. Time’s ticking.
“A-alright. I promise you, Miss Sara. I promise.”
/ /
“Eggs’re going to burn to a crisp if you keep staring. Haha… you’re not bad looking, but I never took you for a narcissist.”
Ah. You’d been staring at your reflection. Studying the knife’s blade like it’d give you all the answers you could never find in the shadows. Making up for lost time.
Sou’s smiling, but his laughter’s brittle. Broken glass -- all sharp edges and frayed nerves. Worry creases his brow, though he turns away to hide it -- pulling down his beanie, retreating into his scarf.
Not unlike a turtle, you muse, and muffle your mirth with a hand, hide the hints of a grin like dog-eared pages. No matter how much you try to smooth them out, the creases remain.
You haven’t had someone worry for you in a long time.
So you thank him with a reply, picking up the knife from where you’d set it down. Clearing your mind.
(You’re well aware that he watches your hands. Shifts away from your touch, stiffens at any sudden movements. In turn, you move a fraction slower towards your knives, voice aloud what ingredient you’re adding next.
If Sou notices, he says nothing -- but you don’t miss the way his shoulders untense, how he’s breathing easier for once. It makes you feel just a little lighter, that smile of his. Makes something in you unwind.
You wonder if anyone else here has seen this side of Sou. Strangely -- selfishly -- some part of you wants to keep that smile to yourself.)
You’ve got a meal to cook and a mouth to feed. In this moment -- that’s all you need to remember. All you need to know. Set your sights on the mission, you tell yourself. Don’t look away.
Don’t you dare tear your gaze from all you’ve done. If you want forgiveness, that’s the least you can do. Keep looking. Scour the horizon for it, peel back the hazy clouds with your bare hands, if you have to. Tear past the nebulous smog layer by layer and then --
Search for the stars. Wait for the sun.
There’s no other reason for your tears. See, absolution burns like a balm, antiseptic to an open wound. Like staring into the sun, searing your tongue.
It’s a peace offering on a platter, a meal cooked with utmost care. It’s the closest thing you can get to asking forgiveness. With all the blood on your hands -- where would you even begin? You’ve never been good with words, so you’ll speak through the sizzling of the pan, smile as you watch him stir.
My apologies for the secondhand head trauma. I have someone I have to protect. You understand, do you not? You would do the same in a heartbeat for yours.
Some things can never be forgiven. But just this once, you hope it will be enough.
Three AM. A client’s haranguing you halfway across the world, and all you want to do is hit the sheets.
The time zone difference is hitting you hard -- the light from your laptop’s the only thing keeping your drooping eyelids from snapping shut. You’re on your fourth godawful cup of coffee, while a precarious tower of long-emptied bentos and cup noodles are stacked nearby, sadly shoved to the side of your work desk.
You didn’t bother checking the expiration date before tossing them in the microwave, your judgement clouded by a sleep-deprived haze and hunger for something within your price range. As long as it was edible...well. Let’s just say your standards could say hello to the sea floor in terms of height.
As much as you love your mother, you have to admit: they were better than the near-sentient eldritch creations she called meals.
One morning, you half expected your natto to start crawling across the kitchen tiles: a second coming of Last Fantasia’s final boss, Gregorian chanting and all. Never mind the (one-winged) angels you nearly saw, hovering in your mind’s eye — you thought it’d send you straight to Heaven with a single bite.
So -- you’ve never had anything like home-made cooking, not like this. (You half wondered what Michelin star restaurant was missing its head chef.)
It’s unfamiliar territory you’re treading, and you’re not sure if your next steps will set off a landmine. You play it safe: set the table with chopsticks, procure plates from the cabinets that had been gathering dust. Hand them to Kai, who’s smiling again.
Odd. That subtle mirth is… genuine, again. That undiluted sincerity makes you want to look away, because how could that warmth ever be meant for you?
It’s blinding, that’s all. Like staring at the core of a molten star in all its intensity, all flare without flickering. Unwavering in its blaze, until it burns itself out.
No. You’d rather not think of dying stars. So you watch as Kai puts it all together. He starts by buttering the toasted bread, a painter. His brush: the butter knife. His canvas: the English muffins. You almost laugh at the image.
"Well, that settles it, then,” you begin, when Kai starts slipping lightly seared bacon between English muffins. … Huh. Suddenly you’re feeling a lot hungrier than you were when you dragged yourself from fitful dreams.
"Oh?" Kai pauses, setting the knife down with a clink.
"The two of us -- we'll have to make it out alive. I've got a lot to learn, right?" Kai’s placing poached eggs over the bacon, now, hair tied back. A sign of trust, you think. He has enough to show his back to you and smile when you keep up with his rapidfire stream of deadpan (ha) puns.
(… Not that you’d be much of a threat.)
"And I have much to teach. When we make it out of here -- I will show you what I have up my sleeve." Kai’s looking out the window above the sink, scanning those artificial skies for familiar stars. He drizzles the poached eggs with dollops of Hollandaise, dripping down the sides. Sprinkles freshly diced parsley and finely chopped chives to crown his culinary masterpiece, steps back to survey his work.
He looks back at you from the kitchen counter, and you rise from your seat to take a plate.
(Contrary to what Kai will say to anyone who’d listen, you did not “leap” up from your seat like a Pavlovian dog in response.)
"Haha. I don't doubt it. Can't make any promises, though." You’d like that, you think as you take a seat at the table. Looks like it hasn’t been used for a long time. A future without your life on the line, huh? Bit too much to ask.
(Hard enough for you to survive as it is. There aren’t many things you wouldn’t do to save your hide. But… you’d give it up to someone you cared for needed it more. Kanna’s only just started living, see. There’s so much more for her, if she makes it out of here alive.
You’re just a washed-up has-been who’s hardly got anything to lose. Stakes’re high, though you weren’t always the betting type. (Well -- aside from gacha games. Rate-up is a lie, and that’s all you’re going to say.)
Kanna deserves better than this. She’s a good kid. Reminds you of the sibling you always wanted, but could never have. She told you once about the flowers she’d been tending for her school’s gardening club, how they soak up the sun and I swear, Sou, sometimes they smile at me!
Don’t swear, you said, but hey, c’mon. You can’t just leave me hanging like that. Ever sing to them?
Kanna sings to ‘em all the time! she hummed, eyes bright — radiant with recollection. I miss Miss Peony and Mister Sunny. Hey, want to hear me sing?
You smirked. Teased: Don’t mistake me for a flower. I know my hair’s green, but…
Kanna pouted for a spell before bouncing right back again. Sunshine incarnate, that kid, even though she had her rainy days… she kept soldiering on.
She sang for you. A little off-key, sure, but no way you’d ever break her heart like that. Not with that smile.
Sure, you had to strain to hear even in the silence that settled over the room, but you’ll remember it in fitful dreams: a brightness that drags you back from that lightless shore. Wards off the crushing weight of dread that haunts you, day by godforsaken day.
Here, you’ve told enough lies to drown a thousand ships, but just this once — honesty seeps through your voice:
Sweetest thing I’ve ever heard, kid, you said, and meant it.)
Kai closes his eyes, like he can’t quite imagine it, either. A life where he can roam the halls at night without having to unsheathe his knives. A life where he can savor the silence without a sense of unease. Sighs.
"No. But we can always hope."
You take a bite of your share, pensive. Your eyes widen at the myriad flavors that melt on your tongue, vividly as a painter’s palette brims with a plethora of colors.
Maybe you’re all trapped here in this hell, struggling to survive. But times like this help you forget. Carving up a slice of heaven reminds you what it’s like to live.
You pick up your chopsticks, thank Kai for the food. You take a bite and feel warmth rush over your skin. Reminds you of the first time you saw the tides rush in: shimmering, sun-washed silk. Your breath caught on that rippling fabric, stolen clean away.
It washed the sea breeze and sweat from your skin. You tasted salt because you were six, and you’d never seen anything like that before. Your father was there. It’d been so long since he came home, you’d nearly forgotten the sound of his voice. You cried then, and -- well. Your eyes are watering now, just a little. You’ve never been one for sentiment, but…
Tastes like hope, you say, smiling. Tastes like home.