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Chapter Text

The night stank of blood. Not the clean tang of a swift kill, but the putrid, metallic rot that lingered after bodies cooled and flies swarmed. The battlefield stretched before them like a graveyard that refused burials, broken armor, torn banners, and limbs scattered like discarded toys.

Olrox knelt among the dead, one hand pressed to his ribs where Mizrak's blade had bitten hours ago. The pain sang through him with each breath, sharp and sweet like a hymn for the dying. He was almost certain the bastard had meant to finish him. Almost.

A shadow moved at the edge of his vision. Mizrak emerged from the smoke, dragging a bloodied spear. Its haft was splintered, its tip painted with more lives than either of them could count. His armor was cracked, dented, and soaked waist-deep in blood, yet the moonlight caught his hair and the fury trembling in his jaw.

Olrox bared his teeth. "Come to finish the job?"

Mizrak's eyes pierced him, cold and assessing. "If I wanted you dead, you'd already be in the dirt."

They stared long enough to hear the distant wails of the wounded, the low crackle of burning siege engines, and the metallic screech of crows tearing at armor to reach the meat beneath. Then a howl rose from the tree line. Not human. Not an animal. Something far worse.

Olrox stood, deliberate, the blood from his side soaking into the black leather of his coat. "That's not ours."

"No," Mizrak said, knuckles white around the spear. "It's theirs."

They didn't need to name them. The greater threat had been stalking both armies for weeks, waiting for the moment when men were too broken to fight back. That moment had come.

~+~

They moved together like two men who despised each other yet hated something else more. Patrols became hunts, hunts became sieges. Creatures with too many teeth and not enough eyes spilled from the dark. Olrox tore them apart with predator's grace, while Mizrak's spear found hearts with soldier's precision.

It wasn't trust. Not yet. But the spaces between them closed. Olrox covered Mizrak's blind side without being asked, and Mizrak shoved Olrox out of deadly strikes instinctively. Fire ran in their bones, and neither wanted to be the one to let it die.

~+~

Between battles, there were nights. Nights when Mizrak sat by a dying fire, sharpening his spearhead, and Olrox lingered close enough to feel the warmth. Words were rare; they shattered fragile truces, but when Mizrak's head bent over parchment, Olrox could see his jaw tighten with the weight of unsaid things.

Mizrak wrote with careful, measured strokes, as if handling a blade that could cut him back.

You're a monster in every story I was told... but when you smile, I start to wonder if the stories were afraid of the truth.

Olrox wrote in bursts, ink blotting where the pain in his ribs stole his breath.

You fight like the sun burns behind your ribs, and I... I want to stand that fire, even if it destroys me.

Neither sent the letters. They stayed folded in pockets, softened with sweat and blood.

~+~

The final night came without ceremony. The enemy stretched across the horizon, a writhing mass of shadows, dripping with hunger. The air thickened, heavy, like the sky before a storm meant to tear the world in half.

Olrox glanced at Mizrak. No nod, no rallying speech. Only shared understanding: this was it.

The first wave hit like a wall of teeth. Mizrak skewered one through the skull, ichor spraying. Olrox tore another apart, blood streaming in the cold air. The ground turned slick. Screams blurred into one endless howl.

Somewhere in the chaos, Mizrak stumbled just for a moment, and something with too many arms closed around him. Olrox didn't think. He moved. His claws shredded the tendon and spine, spilling the creature open. Mizrak was free, face streaked with gore that wasn't his.

"You owe me," Olrox snarled.

"Shut the fuck up and keep killing," Mizrak barked, though there was a trace of fear in his voice, fear not for himself.

~+~

When it ended, the world was quieter than it had any right to be. Monsters and men lay in twisted heaps. Mizrak leaned on his spear, chest heaving, surveying the carnage.

Olrox reached into his coat, pulling out the letter. His hand tightened, crumpling the paper. He looked at Mizrak, blood drying in his hair, shoulders set stubbornly, and shoved it back.

Mizrak's fingers brushed his own pocket, where his letter sat, edges stained. He didn't take it out either.

The unsaid words lingered between them like another battlefield, one they would never cross.

And maybe that was safer. Or maybe it was the cruelest wound they'd ever bear.

Chapter Text

The winter in Tokyo sliced through layers like a knife. Eiji's fingers throbbed as he sketched in the park, graphite smudging his palm. His breath rose in thin clouds that vanished almost immediately. The city felt hushed beneath the falling snow.

In his sketchbook, between a half-finished river drawing and a turpentine-scented page, lay a letter. No envelope, only shaky handwriting:

I still carry the sound of your laugh in my pocket like it's the only map back to myself.

He had written it after dreaming of New York, not the streets, but the cracked vinyl booth of a cheap diner and Ash's smile over half-eaten fries. That smile had been the first place he felt safe in a city that bared its teeth at everyone.

The letter joined the others, scraps, receipts, sketches, all addressed to someone who could never respond.

~+~

But somewhere else, somewhere between dreams and the quiet after death, Ash was answering.

The library was empty. Dust drifted like ash, catching stray light. Shelves held books he would never open; the table by the window was cluttered with torn papers, bloodstained bills, all in his handwriting.

You made the world feel like it wasn't trying to kill me. I wish I could've stayed in it with you.

He didn't remember starting the letters; they just appeared. Writing them tethered him to something beyond blood and survival.

~+~

Eiji walked the streets, scarf tight, watching his reflection shiver in shop windows. The cold brought memories of that final night, the metallic tang of copper, the glare of fluorescent lights over blood.

At home, he pulled a letter from a crowded drawer.

Sometimes I hear footsteps behind me and expect you to be there. I never know if I'm relieved or disappointed when it's just a stranger.

He pressed it to his lips, muffling his breath.

~+~

Ash leaned back in the library chair, staring at the newest letter. The words were messy, rushed:

If I could take one thing from the world with me, it wouldn't be the guns, or the strength, or the street. It would be you. Just you.

For a moment, the library felt alive. He could hear Eiji laughing softly, almost embarrassed. Then silence and dust returned.

~+~

Eiji's nights stretched endlessly. Sleep was a luxury; dreams dragged him through New York streets, chasing someone lost.

One night, he wrote without thinking:

I would've run anywhere with you. Away from the city, away from the noise, even if it meant nowhere. I think that's what scares me most, that I still would.

He folded the slightly torn paper into his sketchbook. The drawer overflowed.

~+~

In the empty library, Ash sat with his head bowed over his latest scrap of paper. He didn't know if he was writing to Eiji or himself anymore.

You're the only person I never had to fight for, because you never made me prove I was worth keeping.

A faint sound echoed, almost a footstep. Only dust and shadows remained. Ash reached for another sheet.

~+~

Neither knew how the letters formed a single story, two lives caught between an ocean, a grave, and the cruel ticking of fate.

Eiji kept his letters bound and untouched. Ash left his scattered across a table that no one would pass.

The world had taken everything else, but not the words.

And in some cruel, aching way, that felt like both a gift and a wound.

Chapter Text

The Butterfly Estate was quieter than it had been in years. Not peaceful quiet, hollow quiet, the kind that left space for memory to echo. The air still carried the faint sweetness of herbs and crushed wisteria, but beneath it lingered something older: the dry scent of paper and dust.

Giyuu hadn't come here for nostalgia. He only needed bandages. The healers had long since stopped fussing over him, realizing his silences were walls no kindness could breach. But while digging through a cabinet in Kanae's old room, his fingers brushed something cool.

A lacquered box. The kind meant for incense or heirlooms. Its black surface had dulled with time, its edges nicked, the faint gold inlay glinting in the dim light. He lifted it, heavier than it looked, and set it on the table.

Inside were letters. Dozens of them, folded into neat bundles, tied with lilac ribbons faded by the years. Some were written on fine parchment, others on scraps of torch paper, the ink sometimes blurred as though her hand had trembled mid-sentence.

The top one was dated long before her death. The first line made him stop:

If kindness could shield you from the world, I'd have wrapped you in it until you believed you deserved it.

He read to the end. It spoke of their training days, of how she noticed what he thought went unseen, how she believed in him when he refused to believe in himself.

The words weighed heavily on the paper, in his hands, in his chest.

~+~

That night, Giyuu sat in his quarters with the letter on his desk, candlelight flickering low. Rain whispered against the roof outside. His fingers hovered over the blank page of his journal. He had never been one to write, but the voice in those letters pulled something raw from him, demanding reply.

He found himself scrawling:

You saw the cracks in me before I did... and I wish I'd learned to smile for you sooner.

Shame flushed through him. He closed the journal quickly, sliding it away as though to hide the words from even himself.

~+~

The weeks dragged on, taut with blood and shadows. Demons pressed harder. Hunts grew bloodier. His journal filled slowly, sometimes a single line, whole pages he couldn't bring himself to reread. Without noticing, his words began to echo hers.

Knae often opened with quiet observations:

The garden is blooming early this year. I thought you'd like to know, since you always sit where the irises grow.

And his replies mirrored hers, though he never meant to:

The garden hasn't bloomed yet. I keep expecting you to be there first.

Her fears, written like flowers opening, cut deeper the more he read:

You stand between the world and others like a shield, but I worry who will shield you.

And his response, almost unthinking:

I've fought so long I don't remember what it feels like to be protected.

~+~

The final battle loomed. Rumors of Muzan slithered through the Corps like shadows under a door. Each mission left more bodies behind.

On one rain-slick night, Giyuu cut down a demon that had already torn through three slayers. Its claws split across his forearm, blood spraying hot in the dark. He finished it with a clean stroke, its head rolling lifeless into the ditch.

He returned to the Estate, soaked in blood, bound his wound with clumsy hands, and sat at his desk still wearing his shredded haori. He wrote, almost feverishly:

If there's a place after this, I hope you're in it. I hope you'll be the first thing I see. I won't need a smile then. You'll know anyway.

~+~

When the day came, the sky was a pale, sickly blue, cold as porcelain. Muzan's forces crashed over them like a tide, blood, steel, the stench of burning flesh under Nichirin blades. Screams blended with ribs breaking, with steel grinding through bone.

Giyuu fought until his body gave way, until his old wound split open again, blood slicking his sword hilt. In the chaos, he remembered Kanae's careful loops of handwriting. For a single heartbeat, the thought of her steadied him.

When it ended, the silence that followed wasn't peace. Just exhaustion.

~+~

Days later, when the dead were buried and the wounded tended, they found his journal. Bloodstained, ink smeared in places, but still legible. Line for line, his words mirrored Kanae's, her letters woven into his own.

No one told him. No one told anyone.

The lacquered box and his journal were set side by side on a shelf no one touched. Years would pass, dust would settle, but the pages would remain. Two voices speaking across death, still tethered, still waiting to be heard.

Chapter Text

The war was over at last. Rimuru hovered above the battlefield that once echoed with screams and steel, now drowned in a silence that felt almost sacred. The stench of blood and smoke had faded, leaving only the faint hum of magic hanging in the air, like a ghost refusing to let go.

Later, he stood out on his balcony, staring at the silver strands of moonlight spread across the sky. The night was quiet, but inside him, his thoughts stormed without end.

He didn't need to turn to know Diablo was behind him. That presence was unmistakable, loyal, constant, yet holding a softness no servant should dare to show.

In the dim light, their eyes met. Diablo's gaze was unflinching, intense, carrying something Rimuru wasn't sure he could bear to face.

"Is there something you want to say?" Rimuru asked, his voice lower than intended, touched with hesitation.

Diablo dipped his head, his composure faltering just slightly. "My lord, I exist only for you. Nothing else matters."

Rimuru's chest tightened. So much lay unsaid between them: loyalty, yearning, fear. Words that could shatter everything if spoken aloud. Instead, he turned away, sat at his desk, and opened a weathered notebook.

He wrote with careful strokes:

Sometimes I wonder if you'd still look at me the same if I stopped being your lord... and simply became yours.

Folding the note, he slipped it between the pages filled with other unsent confessions, ones he could never bring himself to speak.

~+~

In his chamber, Diablo sat alone while candlelight threw restless shadows across the walls. His journal lay open across his lap, edges frayed from countless nights of clinging to words he could never voice.

If eternity means serving you, then may the heavens be merciful enough to make it longer.

He let his fingers drift over the fresh ink as though it were a vow etched into his soul.

Loyalty had always been his armor, yet lately it felt more like chains. Could he really love the one he served? Or was it something darker, need, obsession, hunger he dared not name?

Every time he tried to speak, the words lodged in his throat like a blade. So he wrote instead.

~+~

The magical disturbances began subtly, bare ripples threading into their dreams, fragments of thoughts that didn't belong to them.

One night, Rimuru woke with Diablo's handwriting seared into his mind, those unspoken vows pressing hard against his chest. At the same moment, Diablo stirred with Rimuru's questions echoing in his head, confessions too raw for daylight.

They met within a dream shaped from their unsent letters, a world where silence became language, where loyalty blurred into longing, where master and servant ceased to exist as separate.

"Why do you hesitate?" Diablo's whisper cut through the dream's stillness.

Rimuru's eyes burned with a storm. "Because if I cross that line... I could lose you. And maybe lose myself too."

Diablo's hand lifted, brushing his cheek with quiet care. "Or maybe you'd finally find who you really are."

The dream shattered with the coming dawn, sunlight scattering shadows and leaving only the weight of truth behind.

~+~

By morning, they sat across from one another, the silence heavy enough to crush.

At last, Diablo spoke, his voice steady but raw. "If I am to serve, then let me serve with everything I am, not just your strength- but your heart."

Rimuru's breath caught. Slowly, he reached across, their hands intertwining, steadying them both in a fragile truth that had been too long delayed.

"Then we'll walk this path together," he whispered, quiet but certain. "Not as lord and servant, but as something more. Something real."

The war was behind them, and the silence of the night had turned into a promise. In the first light of dawn, two souls, long bound by unsent words, finally spoke.

Chapter Text

The off-season stretched long and empty, a quiet ride pulling them apart when all they wanted was to stay close.

Kenma's phone buzzed late one night. He blinked at the screen, half-expecting it to be another message about drills or match schedules. But it wasn't.

Akaashi: "You awake?"

 

He smirked, fingers moving over the keyboard like they knew exactly where to go.

Kenma: "Yeah. You?"

 

And so it began.

What started as casual check-ins, stats, game strategies, and favorite new releases slowly morphed into something else. Conversations that drifted like smoke, soft and curling around things neither dared say aloud.

Akaashi told Kenma about the silence he sometimes felt, the quiet that wasn't emptiness, but a kind of waiting, a space where he felt something like peace.

Kenma replied with something closer to a confession:

You're the only person who makes the noise in my head sound like music.

 

Neither acknowledged the shift. Neither broke the fragile veil over their growing connection.

But they saved everything. Screenshots tucked away in secret folders, conversations replayed in quiet moments. Words too fragile to say but too heavy to forget.

And then came the night that changed everything.

Kenma was cleaning out his phone, deleting clutter, old chats, and clearing space, when his thumb slipped. A file was sent. Not to Akaashi. To their team group chat.

The message was a draft. Unsent. Raw and vulnerable.

I want to tell you everything I don't know how to say. That you're not just a teammate, but the quiet part of me that finally feels loud enough to breathe.

 

The silence that followed was thick enough to choke on.

Akaashi was the first to speak, his reply breaking the frozen air:

"Kenma... I think I've been waiting for this for years."

 

Laughter spilled out, nervous, shaky relief wrapped in disbelief.

They met the next day, words hanging between them like fragile glass.

Kenma's voice was low: "I thought if I said it, it'd break everything."

Akaashi smiled, eyes warm and steady: "Maybe it was time to break, so something real could grow."

They didn't need more words after that.

Their unsent lines became the foundation, raw, honest, and finally shared.

Chapter Text

The regional exhibition match wasn't supposed to mean much, just a footnote after the hell that was training camp. They'd run until their lungs gave out, legs trembling from drills so brutal that even the loudmouths shut up. Everyone had been dragged past their limits, yet somehow Tsukishima pushed through with that trademark scowl, while Kageyama... Kageyama didn't even flinch. He was built different, a machine in human skin.

When the pairings came out, the gym buzzed with laughter that carried an edge. "Good luck surviving that, Tsukki," Yamaguchi muttered, half-joking, half-sympathetic. Kageyama didn't so much as blink, just gave his usual flat stare before going back to taping his fingers.

Their punishment came in the form of late-night strategy sessions. While everyone else showered and collapsed in their bunks, Tsukishima and Kageyama sat under the harsh glow of a flickering light, voices low but sharp. "You keep setting like that and we're dead in the water," Tsukishima muttered, leaning back in his chair. "And if you'd jump properly, maybe I wouldn't have to set for miracles," Kageyama shot back instantly.

Every word felt like a blade, cutting through the walls the other built. But in the spaces between the fights, something shifted.

Sometimes, Tsukishima caught himself starting when Kageyama leaned over scrap paper, scribbling plays, shoulders tense and focused. Sometimes, mid-eye-roll, he'd notice the corner of Kageyama's mouth twitch, not quite a smile, but enough to make the room feel less suffocating.

They started writing things they'd never dare say.

Tsukishima: You're infuriating... and somehow the only person I don't want to shut out.

Kageyama: I don't know when winning stopped meaning points on a scoreboard and started meaning making you smile.

Neither message ever left the drafts folder. Hidden. Buried.

Until someone stumbled on them.

It was nothing, just a stupid slip after practice. Hinata, buzzing with leftover energy, snatched Kageyama's phone to show him a meme. "What the hell is-" His voice cut off. The room went still. Tsukishima froze mid-pack as Kageyama lunged for his phone, panic written across his face. Hinata's eyes darted between them. "Oh. Ohhh." His grin cracked. "I'll... just... go."

The door shut, but the silence stuck like glue.

"What the fuck did he see?" Tsukishima demanded, though his chest twisted tight. Kageyama didn't look up. He shoved the phone in his pocket and muttered, "Yes."

That one word was enough to lock Tsukishima's jaw. A thousand unsaid things clawed their way up, but none made it out.

They didn't talk that night. Or the one after.

By the time the match rolled around, they played like strangers forced into the same script. Sets were too sharp. Spikes too reckless. And every glance across the court felt like standing at the edge of a roof, unsure if you'd jump, or be shoved.

The last rally came down to Tsukishima. Kageyama's set was perfect, razor-clean. He could've finished it safe. Instead, he spiked with enough force to make the libero flinch, the sound of impact ringing like a gunshot.

They won.

But the cheers felt like they belonged to another world.

In the tunnel, Tsukishima finally broke the silence. "You're a coward." His voice was low and steady, sharp enough to cut. Kageyama turned, eyes dark. "So are you."

It could've ended there. Should've. But Tsuskishima stepped forward, close enough to feel the heat off his skin. "If you think I'm gonna keep playing defense with my feelings just to make things easier for you, you're out of your goddamn mind."

Kageyama's breath caught, not from fear, not from shock, but like someone who'd been holding it in too long.

What came after wasn't pretty. Their words were jagged, messy, real. They didn't apologize. They didn't confess. Not in the way anyone else would've wanted.

But later that night, Tsukishima unlocked his phone to find one new message sitting in their thread:

Kageyama: Winning means making you smile. Still does.

And this time, it stayed sent.

Chapter Text

The war was finally over.

No more titans dragging themselves across the horizon. No more screams drowned out by sirens. No more waiting for death in a concrete coffin that stank of rust and resignation.

And yet... peace wasn't what Shinji thought it would be.

Tokyo-3 was quiet now. Too quiet. It wasn't the kind of quiet that comforted, it grated. Every note from his Walkman seemed too loud. Every breath echoed. Every thought screamed back at him until he couldn't push it down anymore.

Kaworu was still here. Alive. A miracle, or maybe a contradiction, that Shinji didn't dare question. He'd come back from the edge of nothing, stripped of wings and divinity, left only human. Terrifyingly, achingly human.

They filled their days with music, not words. Kaworu's hands moved across the piano like he was pulling light of the air, and Shinji sat beside him, pretending to follow along. Pretending that the sound could drown out the questions eating at him.

Do you love me? Or do you just love what I was?

It was stupid. Small. But it was tearing him apart.

Because Shinji remembered that look, how Kaworu once gazed at him not just with affection, but reverence. Reverence for the boy who carried the weight of Angels in his bones. Reverence for the human who stood at the end of the world and refused to run.

But that boy was gone. That word was gone. Now, there was just Shinji: ordinary, cowardly, cracked around the edges. And Kaworu, still smiling like nothing had changed, even though everything had.

One night, the sky felt too big, too heavy. The stars sprawled like a wound across the darkness, and Shinji hated them for it. He sat outside their building, shoulders hunched, hands stuffed deep in his jacket. The cold nipped at his skin, but he barely felt it anymore.

Kaworu found him there. Barefoot, of course. Shoes had always been too human for him to brother with.

"You're avoiding the sky again," Kaworu said, quiet but certain.

"I'm just... tired."

"That's not the same thing."

Shinji said nothing. His throat was too tight, words sharp enough to cut if he tried to force them out.

Kaworu sat next to him, not touching, but close enough that Shinji could feel the warmth radiating from him. The silence stretched, heavy, filled with whispers Shinji couldn't shut out.

And then, it cracked.

"Sometimes I wonder," Shinji breathed, "if you only loved me because I was the boy you met when you were still an Angel."

The words hung there like poison. Kaworu didn't flinch. He didn't look away.

He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, letting the night press in around them.

"If I could rewrite the stars," Kaworu said, steady in a way Shinji could never be, "I'd make sure they only ever led me to you."

Shinji almost laughed. It sounded rehearsed, like some cheesy line out of a movie.

But then Kaworu turned, really turned, and the look in his eyes wasn't pretty, it was raw. Fierce. Like he'd cut the truth out of himself just to hand it to Shinji.

"It was never about what you were," Kaworu continued. "Not the pilot. Not the boy who carried the world. Not the one who stood against gods and monsters. I love you because you're you. Even if you lost everything else. Even if no one remembered your name. Even if I forgot."

The words hit too hard. The world blurred, and Shinji realized too late that he was crying. He hated it, hated how small it made him feel. But Kaworu didn't call him out. He just reached, slow enough for Shinji to refuse.

Shinji didn't.

Their hands met, rough against soft, and it felt like a choice. Not destiny. Not sacrifice. Just a promise made in the moment, one you had to keep choosing every single day, even when it hurt.

Above them, the stars burned, too far to touch, too indifferent to care.

But for once, Shinji didn't need them to.

Kaworu was here. And that was enough.

Chapter Text

It had been seven months since Shadow Moses. Seven months since snow burned in their lungs and blood steamed against ice. Seven months since Snake walked away without looking back, and Meryl learned that silence could kill slower than a bullet but hurt just the same.

She buried herself in missions. Terror cells in Africa. Arms deals in Karachi. Extraction ops that lasted weeks in jungles where even the air tasted like rot. She fought so hard, she stopped noticing the bruises until the shower stung.

The army taught her how to move on. Snake had taught her how to survive. Neither had taught her what to do with the hole he left behind.

She kept a mission log. Officially, it was for recon notes. Unofficially, it was where she hid him. You taught me how to fight, but you never taught me what to do when the battle is over and you're gone. She'd write it in between coordinates and casualty counts, knowing it would never be sent. Knowing it was safer that way.

Snake, wherever the hell he was, did the same. His mission logs were just as bloody, but between the kill confirmations and weapons reports, there were ghosts. I've been in more foxholes than I can count, but the safest I ever felt was next to you. Words he'd never transmit, because sentiment was more dangerous than a minefield.

~+~

They met again in a back alley in Budapest.

The op was blacker than black, not on any record, not acknowledged by any chain of command. Intel said a splinter PMC was smuggling something worse than nukes, and the trail ran through the city's veins like an infection.

She spotted him first, shadow pressed against shadow. Hair longer. Beard is a little thicker. Eyes still sharp enough to cut through steel.

"Snake." Her voice was steel over glass.

"Meryl." He was gravel. Dry. Familiar.

Neither hugged. Soldiers didn't.

They slipped into cover together as naturally as breathing, rifles up, boots silent on wet cobblestone. The rain smelled like diesel. Neon flickered overhead, warping puddles into blood-colored stains.

~+~

The first kill came fast.

A guard rounded the corner and saw too much. Meryl's blade was already in his throat before his mouth could open. Snake caught the body, lowered it slowly, and wiped the knife clean without a word.

The next was messier. Snake shot through a door just as it burst open, the impact sprayed the wall behind them with bone and brain.

Neither flinched.

~+~

By the third night, they'd taken out fifteen men and destroyed two weapons caches. The mission was going to hell sideways, but they moved like they had at Shadow Moses, perfectly in step, each knowing where the other would be without looking.

Between firefights, they crouched in dark rooms, reloading in silence. Meryl could hear his breathing, steady even when his hands were red to the wrists. Snake could hear her muttering under her breath when she thought he wasn't listening.

There was something worse than the firefights, the pauses. That was when the words almost came out.

~+~

On the fifth night, it finally broke.

They were pinned in a warehouse, moonlight streaming through bullet holes in the tin roof. Blood pooled beneath them from bodies they'd cut down minutes earlier. Meryl's leg was grazed. Snake's shoulder was bleeding. They were concerned but not dead, not yet.

"Snake." Her voice cracked like a rifle shot.

He glanced at her, eyes hard, but not at her. Past her. Always past her.

"You left."

He chambered a round. "I had to."

"You didn't."

Bullets tore through the crate between them, splinters flying. She didn't stop.

"I wrote things, Snake. Stuff I'll never send. Stuff that's been rotting in my head since Shadow Moses."

He met her eyes finally, and it was like staring into a storm. "You think I didn't?"

The next moment was chaos, an enemy grenade rolled in, and Snake tackled her behind cover just before it went off. The blast shredded the air, painting the walls in red and gray.

When the ringing in her ears faded, he was still holding her.

"You taught me how to fight," she said, voice raw, "but you never taught me what to do when the battle is over and you're gone."

He looked at her like it hurt to breathe. "I've been in more foxholes than I can count, Meryl... but the safest I ever felt was next to you."

~+~

They made it out. Barely.

The op was a success on paper, but the mission logs told a different story. Still, neither sent the words. They went back into the shadows, each carrying the weight of what they hadn't said.

Some confessions were meant for foxholes. Some were meant to die with you.

Chapter Text

The stage was never silent. Even in the moments before the lights burned their eyes raw, the hum of the crowd rattled through the bones like a second pulse.

Hyuna stood behind the curtain, shoulders squared, fists clenched, her breathing sharp enough to slice skin. Luka was next to her, leaning against the wall like he owned it, a crooked smirk dancing on his lips as if none of this meant a damn thing.

"You're late," she hissed, not looking at him.

"And you're still here," he replied, voice lazy, but his eyes, those storm-blue knives, were fixed on her. "Guess we both disappoint each other."

Her jaw tightened. "Go to hell."

He grinned, tilting his head. "Already there. You're my tour guide."

The announcer's voice thundered, pulling them forward like hooks in the ribs. The moment the curtain tore open, the bloodlust began. Alien Stage wasn't a performance; it was a slaughterhouse dressed in neon and steel.

The crowd roared for carnage.

The first round came hard, metallic fangs flashing from an opponent that moved like a shadow and struck like a guillotine. Hyuna ducked, rolled, and kicked. Luka was a whirlwind beside her, his blade splitting the air was clean, merciless arcs. They didn't have to speak; they never did. Their bodies read each other like a second language.

By the time the first opponent fell, face caved in, blood slicking the floor, Hyuna's hands were trembling, but not from fear. From rage. From adrenaline. From the way Luka's voice brushed her ear as he muttered, "You're welcome," before charging into the night fight.

They kept moving. They kept killing. And between each round, the show kept filming.

Backstage, someone shoved a mic toward her face. "Hyuna, people are talking about your... chemistry with Luka. Is there something there?"

She glared into the camera, sweat streaking her face. "There's nothing there but survival."

It was a lie. And the producers knew it. They cut the fights with stolen shots of the two of them, backs touching, glances sharp as broken glass, arguments caught half on mic. They made them look like a story.

And maybe they were. Just not the one the crowd thought.

She had a message typed out in her communicator, one she never sent:

You drive me insane... but I'd still notice if you were gone.

 

Luka had one too. Simpler.

 

No matter how many times you push me away, I keep finding my way back to you.

 

Neither of them hit send.

~+~

When the semi-final came, the stage turned cruel. They were pitted against fighters who smiled as they cut into flesh, who carved patterns into skin just to hear the crowd gasp. Hyuna's shoulder tore open in the first thirty seconds; Luka's lip split wide enough for blood to drip down his throat.

But they didn't break. Every blow he took, she avenged. Every cut she took, he covered. The floor was slippery by the end, red soaking into the metal grooves, their bodies dragging but still swinging.

The final bell rang. The crowd screamed. They'd won.

Hyuna's head hung low, hair clinging to her face. Luka stumbled to her side, hand catching her elbow. His palm was hot, slick. Blood. Hers? His? She didn't ask.

"You're insane," she muttered.

"You like it," he breathed back.

~+~

The finale came without warning. The rules changed. Only one could walk out.

The crowd lost its mind.

She stared at him, pulse roaring in her ears. "We can find a way-"

"Hyuna," he said, voice steady in a way that terrified her, "we both know how this ends."

She saw it then, his shoulders loosening, his blade lowering. The bastard wasn't going to fight. He was going to give it to her.

"No," she snapped. "You don't get to-"

The gunshot cut her off. Not hers. Not his. The producers had decided they were too slow.

Luka's body folded. She caught him before he hit the ground, her hands useless against the rush of blood from his chest.

"Why-" she choked.

His breath hitched, warm against her cheek. "Told you... I'd always come back..."

And then he didn't.

~+~

The crowd roared. The lights burned. Hyuna stood alone on the stage, blood dripping from her hands, her unsent message still glowing in her communicator.

She hit send.

Too late.

Chapter Text

The first time Lingling saw Orm again, it was like running headfirst into a door she didn't know was still there. The breath punched out of her. Not because Orm looked different, though she did, her hair shorter, shoulders squared like someone who'd fought battles Lingling would never know, but because she looked the same in ways that made memory crawl under her skin. The same sharp mouth that could slice or soothe. The same eyes that once refused to look away, even when Lingling wished they would.

They met in a coffee shop by accident, though Lingling had to wonder if fate was just being smug now. A decade gone, and the air between them still carried the taste of an unfinished sentence.

"Fahlada," Orm said, her voice quieter than Lingling remembered, but heavier. Weighted by the year. With everything they didn't talk about. Lingling swallowed the urge to apologize because she'd done that before, and it hadn't been enough.

They spoke like people testing the floorboards of an old house, making sure it could still hold them. Weather. Work. The city's traffic. Nothing dangerous. Nothing real.

But every word Orm gave her lodged in Lingling's chest like it had claws.

~+~

Lingling's nights became paper and ink. She wrote in the half-light, pen dragging across notebooks too fragile to carry the full gravity of what she wanted to say. I'm sorry I left before you could understand why. I hated you the night we ended. I hated you because I still loved you. Do you ever think of me in the quiet?

She didn't send them. She tucked them into the same drawer she used to hide letters Orm had sent her in the first year after the breakup, letters she'd never been brave enough to open.

~+~

Orm, for her part, found herself drafting messages she deleted before they ever had a subject line. You were the only person who made me feel like I could be more than I was. I wanted to forgive you long before I could. You broke me, but I kept the pieces because they were yours.

It was pathetic, she thought. She'd survived wars, literal and otherwise, but the thought of pressing "send" on a truth like that made her feel like she was back in their last apartment, watching Lingling pack her life into boxes while pretending her own hands weren't shaking.

~+~

Weeks later, they found themselves walking together. The city had grown around them, glass and steel replacing the corners where they once made promises with the arrogance of youth.

They passed that street. The one where they'd fought so loudly that strangers stared. The one where Orm had said, "You don't get to hurt me and still hold me," and Lingling had said nothing, because she didn't have an answer that wouldn't break them faster.

Now, Orm glanced sideways, a small twitch at the corner of her mouth. "Haven't been here in years."

Lingling's pulse kicked hard in her throat. "Me neither."

The silence after was the kind you could drown in.

~+~

That night, Lingling didn't write. She took the oldest letter from her drawer, one she'd written only months after they split, and shoved it into her jacket pocket without reading it.

Orm didn't delete her message this time. She saved it as a draft, locked the phone, and slipped it into her jeans. It felt like carrying a loaded weapon.

~+~

They ended up on a rooftop after a charity event, the city stretched below like an open wound. The wind caught Lingling's hair, pulling strands into her mouth. Orm reached out without thinking, tucking them behind her ear, and the touch was enough to unravel something Lingling had been holding tight for years.

"I hurt you," Lingling said, the words tearing out of her. "And you hurt me. But I can't-" She stopped, swallowing back the rest, because the rest was too much.

Orm's gaze didn't waver. "You were my past," she said. "My regret. And somehow..." She hesitated, and Lingling could almost see her weighing the risk. "... my only chance at healing."

The words landed heavily. Not a confession. Not yet. But a door cracked open, just enough for air to get through.

Lingling reached into her pocket and pressed the folded letter into Orm's hand. Orm, in turn, took out her phone, opened her draft, and handed it over.

They didn't read them right there. Some things still needed to survive the night before they could survive the morning.

But as they stood on that rooftop, closer than they'd been in years, Lingling realized something: The ghosts between them weren't gone. But for the first time, they weren't standing in the way.

Chapter Text

The lights never stopped screaming. Alien Stage wasn't a performance; it was a crucible, a place where the weak bled and the strong learned how to survive in the smell of iron and fear.

Till stood at the edge of the stage, breathing through the burn in his lungs, hands slick with sweat and blood. He watched Ivan across the arena, movements sharp, precise, a predator in neon armor. Every twitch, every glance, was a challenge, a dare. They were rivals by design and by instinct.

"You're slow," Ivan said, voice carrying over the roar of the audience. Not a tease. Not a warning. Pure predation.

"Try me," Till muttered back, fists tightening.

The first clash came like a storm, the metal of their weapons collided, sparks flying, the smell of scorched air and blood thick around them. Till's knuckles cracked on impact, teeth grinding against grit, while Ivan smirked, effortless as a ghost, weaving through attacks like he had eyes in the back of his head.

And yet... the moment Ivan's blade nicked Till's shoulder, he hesitated. Just a fraction. Enough for Till to notice.

~+~

Backstage, they were a different war. Sweat still on their skin, weapons dripping, hearts hammering, but words they couldn't speak kept clawing at their throats.

Till's communicator vibrated silently in his pocket. Another unsent draft:

I'm scared to admit it, but maybe I don't want to win if it means losing you.

 

He hid it behind his ribcage like a bullet he couldn't fire.

Ivan, across the room, typed and deleted the same words over and over:

 

You're the only one who's ever made me want to break the rules, and maybe even the game.

 

Neither sent them. The stakes were too high, the world too sharp.

~+~

The twist came like a grenade. The producers announced a sudden alliance round. Till and Ivan, enemies by every metric, had to pair up or lose everything. The crowd roared, unaware they were about to watch fireworks that no script could contain.

"You're joking," Till hissed, eyes narrowing.

Ivan just shrugged, a slow grin spreading over his bruised face. "Not even a little."

The arena shifted under their feet, a neon hellscape of traps and mechanical beasts. They moved like predators circling a kill, instinct guiding them more than strategy. Every coordinated strike felt intimate, almost intimate, too intimate.

And when one of the arena's horrors lunged at Till from the shadows, Ivan was there before the claws could close. His hand gripped Till's forearm, steady, warm, alive.

"You alright?"

Till's heart thumped, stupid and fast. "I- yeah."

And they moved on, side by side, in perfect rhythm.

~+~

Between fights, the air backstage was sharp with exhaustion and adrenaline. Neither spoke of the unsent messages or the way their fingers brushed when handing weapons off. Neither admitted the heat behind their glances.

But the tension built, a cord pulling taut, fraying at the edges. Till wanted to speak. Ivan wanted to speak. And yet, neither could risk the words.

~+~

The final round was chaos incarnate. Mechanical traps, electrified floors, a fog of smoke, and sparks made it impossible to see more than a foot ahead. Their alliance wasn't just strategic; it was survival.

Till felt Ivan's presence like a heartbeat in the dark, guiding him, protecting him, challenging him in ways that were both infuriating and... necessary. Every attack was a conversation. Every dodge a confession.

When they reached the top platform, victorious but bleeding, the arena shook with applause. The producers wanted a photo. They wanted smiles. They wanted the story of rivals-turned-champions.

Till didn't smile. He looked at Ivan, the neon lights reflecting in eyes that were half exhaustion, half something else. "This- us... I don't know if I want it to end," he muttered, almost to himself.

Ivan stepped closer, close enough to feel the heat of Till's breath. "Then don't let it," he whispered. "We're breaking the rules tonight."

And maybe for the first time, the game wasn't enough to keep them apart.

~+~

The unsent messages didn't need to exist anymore. Till's draft went into Ivan's hand. Ivan's draft went into Till's.

No words needed translating. They had fought, survived, and finally, in the neon carnage of Alien Stage, they found each other.

Even if the world tried to tear them apart next round, even if the next fight demanded blood and fire, they'd face it together.

Chapter Text

The night stank of ash. Storybrooke had burned again, another curse, another fight Emma barely understood but had long since stopped questioning. Smoke clung stubbornly to the air, scratching her lungs with every breath as she picked through what was left of Regina's house. Half the walls were gone, glass scattered across the floor like shattered stars.

Emma shoved aside splintered beams, boots crunching over broken shards. In the back, Regina's voice carried, a low, exhausted murmur of spells, like the words themselves weighed too much.

That was when Emma saw it.

A leather-bound journal, singed at the edges but still whole. It was wedged under a collapsed shelf, spared by the fire as if fate itself had chosen to protect it. She picked it up, flipping through pages filled with Regina's sharp, elegant handwriting, the kind that made even anger look like poetry.

Emma hadn't planned to read it. But she did.

Bitterness. Venom. Regret carved into ink so deep it bled. Every entry was heavy, as if Regina had been crushing her own heart flat against the paper, punishing herself for sins she couldn't undo.

And then-

One page stopped her cold.

It wasn't dated. Just a letter. Unfinished, unsent. Not addressed to anyone, but Emma knew. She knew it was written for her.

"You make me want to believe in happy endings again. But I've ruined too many to ever deserve one with you."

Emma snapped the book shut, too fast, like the words might leap out and brand themselves onto her skin. But it was too late, they were already carved into her. Deeper than any wound Rumple, Cora, or any curse could inflict.

Because she understood. She'd done the same thing.

Not in journals, but in ghost drafts of texts never sent, in notes she tore to shreds before anyone could find them. "I don't know how to stop looking at you like you're the only one who can break me and save me at the same time." Words she'd buried. Words she'd feared.

Her silence was just as damning as Regina's.

And now? Another curse was on its way. They could feel it pressing in from the edges of the world, dark and suffocating. Soon Storybrooke would bleed again, and she and Regina would be thrown together into the fire.

Emma shoved the journal inside her jacket, jaw clenched. Maybe she'd confront Regina. Maybe she wouldn't. Maybe the words would just rot in her pocket, the way they had in Regina's.

~+~

Dawn brought hell with it.

The streets cracked open, tar bleeding like black veins. Screams split the air as fog swallowed the town whole. And in the chaos, Emma and Regina stood shoulder to shoulder, shaking, but unyielding. Sword and fire.

The fight was brutal. Shadows tore through anyone too slow. Emma's blade split monsters that still looked too much like people, hot blood splattering across her face. Beside her, Regina's fire wasn't elegance anymore, it was grief and fury made flesh. She burned the world apart to save it, and Emma loved her for it. God, she loved her for it.

Maybe it was the blood in her mouth, maybe it was knowing they might not survive this time, whatever it was, Emma broke.

"Regina!"

Regina spun toward her, soot and sweat streaking her face.

"I read it!" Emma's voice cracked like something raw and jagged. "The journal. The letter. I know."

For a heartbeat Regina froze, long enough for a shadow to nearly gut her before Emma cut it down.

"You weren't supposed to," Regina snarled, her voice fractured. "You shouldn't have-"

"Shut up!" Emma's roar ripped out of her. She grabbed Regina's arm, fingers biting in. "I've been writing mine too. All of them unsent. All of them choking me."

The world was breaking around them, but Emma's voice shook like this mattered more than survival.

"I don't know how to stop looking at you like you're the only one who can break me and save me at the same time. And I'm fucking tired of pretending I don't."

Regina's face crumpled, not weak, not broken, but raw, stripped bare.

"You think I don't want to?" she rasped. "You think I haven't destroyed ever chance at happiness I ever had? You think I wouldn't ruin you too?"

Emma stepped closer. The fog clawed at them, shadows screaming.

"I don't care."

She meant it. More than anything.

Regina's lips parted, trembling, like she might finally say it back, like maybe, for once, the words would burn with them instead of against them.

But then the curse surged. The ground split. And Emma watched in horror as Regina shoved her out of the way, taking the hit herself.

Emma's scream ripped through the chaos.

Blood soaked Regina's side, red blooming fast. She forced one last spell out, fire consuming the monster that struck her, before collapsing into Emma's arms.

"Don't you dare," Emma begged, shaking, hands slick with blood. "Don't you fucking dare leave this unsaid-"

Regina's shaking hands framed Emma's face. Her eyes softened, dark and endless.

"You make me want to believe in happy endings again." Her voice broke on the words. "But I'll never deserve one with you."

Emma's tears blurred everything into smoke and ruin. "Fuck deserve," she whispered. "Just stay."

But the blood kept coming. The fog screamed louder. And the words hung heavy, spoken and unsent all at once.

Because sometimes love wasn't enough to break a curse.

Sometimes it was just another wound, left open, bleeding.

Chapter Text

The shrine didn't welcome him.

Okarun stood at the edge of the sacred grounds, sweat dripping from his jawline, his body bruised and cut open in a dozen places. The protective seal shimmered faintly across the torii gate, a thin veil of power that bristled against him like static. His sneakers stopped just short of it, and for all alien-gifted speed and strength, he couldn't pass through.

Momo pressed her palm to the charm hanging from the gate. Her hair stuck to her face in damp strands, her shirt ripped where claws had grazed her ribs. She shot him a look that was equal parts exasperated and worried.

"You'll fry if you try to walk through. The seal still thinks you're trouble."

He tried to laugh, but it came out raw, jagged. "Can't argue with that."

Her fingers tightened on the charm. With a whisper, the seal broke. The veil shimmered once, then dissolved, spilling him into her world again.

"Go on, she said, stepping aside.

Okarun passed under the gate, the ground trembling faintly as though the shrine itself recognized him for the first time. He glanced at Momo, and the weight of her small smile, gentle, tired, but real, hit harder than any monster.

"Thanks," he muttered.

"Don't mention it," she said, though her voice betrayed something softer.

The shrine should have been a safe place. But safety never lasted long in their world.

~+~

The ground shifted.

Smoke still curled from the broken stones, hissing where yokai blood had scorched them. Okarun sat on the shrine steps, his arms bleeding freely, his jeans torn where something had nearly gutted him. He spat black muck into the dirt.

"Next time," he wheezed, "I'm picking the snacks. You burn too many calories dragging my ass around."

Momo leaned against the shrine gate, clutching her side, her lungs on fire. "Shut it, I told you not to charge in first. My kick was cooler, anyway."

He laughed, pained, shaking, but genuine. "Bullshit. You just had better lighting." He mimed a kick, his legs wobbling.

She wanted to roll her eyes. But the stupid gesture made her chest unclench. Banter meant they were alive. Banter meant they hadn't lost.

What neither of them admitted was heavier than the blood pooling under their shoes. What neither of them sent sat glowing on their phones, drafts typed in lonely hours, erased before sunrise.

~+~

That's when the air curdled.

The torii gate groaned as though some unseen hand pressed on it. A ripple of pressure crawled through the shrine, prickling their skin. Okarun's phone buzzed in his pocket, not from a message but from static.

Words slithered across the cracked screen in crooked font:

"The unspoken tastes sweeter than screams."

Then came a voice, his voice, but not his own.

"I don't know if I'm braver because of you, or just stupid enough to follow you anywhere."

His blood iced. That was his draft. The one he'd never dared to send.

Momo's head snapped toward him. Her phone slipped from her pocket, the screen glowing white. A message blazed across it, her unsent confession:

"You make it really hard to tell if I'm protecting you... or if you're the one keeping me safe."

The shadows of the shrine writhed. Black sludge poured from the cracked earth, twisting upward into a yokai tall as the torii, its mouth sewn shut, dozens of hands clawing forward. Its chest glowed with stolen words, confessions ripped raw from souls.

Their phones screamed for it.

~+~

Momo launched first, her heel smashing into one of its heads. It burst in a spray of tar, but two more grew in its place, babbling broken words. Okarun blazed forward, his alien light burning his skin as he slammed his fist into its chest. His phone shrieked with her message:

"You make it really hard to tell-"

"Shut the fuck up!" Momo roared, her knee shattering another neck.

But the yokai fed on silence, on shame. The more they panicked, the clearer their confessions rang.

~+~

Okarun's fear wasn't of dying. It was of Momo hearing the truth like this, dragged out by some parasite, broadcast through blood and screams.

He dodged a hand that clawed for his throat, his ribs burning, and bellowed over the chaos:

"Momo! I meant it!"

She froze mid-kick. "Wh-"

"The message! I wrote that shit!" His fist cracked through the yokai's ribs. "I am braver because of you! Or stupid, whatever, but it's real!"

Her phone spat out her own words again, taunting. She stared at him, the fight raging around them, and for once her voice wasn't sharp but shaking:

"Fine! You keep me safe, too! Happy, you idiot?"

The yokai faltered. Its hands spasmed, its stitched mouth tearing open. Tar vomited out, splattering the stones.

Together, they struck, her heel through its spine, his alien blaze ripping it apart. The yokai burst in a rain of gore, staining the shrine black.

The barrier shimmered faintly again, but the shrine stayed quiet. No whispers. No screams. Just the thud of their breathing.

~+~

Okarun smeared gore from his face, grinning weakly. "Guess... that's one way to say it."

Momo stared at him, cheeks pink beneath the soot. Then she shook her head, voice ragged.

"You're still not picking the snacks."

He laughed, hoarse, almost broken. "Fine. But admit it, by kick was cooler."

"Not a fucking chance."

Their footsteps echoed across the cracked stones, carrying their confessions at last, words no longer sealed, no longer unsent.

And somewhere between silence and screams, the shrine let him stay.

Chapter Text

The rehabilitation wing smelled of antiseptic, with just the faintest trace of rain leaking in through the vents. It was the kind of sterile calm that pressed on Hajime's chest every time he breathed. Too neat. Too controlled. Too suffocating. Above, fluorescent lights hummed, and around him, the quiet shuffling of other participants filled the air, people caught up in their routines, blind to the storm raging in his head.

Nagito sat across from him, knees pulled to his chest, eyes lowered to the floor. There was a softness in his posture that felt like bait. Hajime knew better. He knew the silence wouldn't last. Sooner or later, Nagito would speak, and his words would hit like glass shards, sharp and unpredictable.

"You're frowning again," Nagito murmured, his voice barely louder than a breath.

Hajime's grip tightened around the pen in his hand. He wanted to snap at him, cut him off with something harsh. Instead, all he managed was a low grunt.

"Frowning suits you," Nagito added, and with it came that tilt of his head, that half-smile that sent Hajime's chest tightening in ways he hated. The worst part was that it made his pulse skip.

~+~

In the corners of the wing where no one lingered, Hajime started keeping a notebook. A dumping ground for complaints that bled into confessions before he could stop them.

You drive me insane, he scrawled once, underlining it twice. But I don't know if I want to run from you... or toward you.

Nagito, of course, had his own little secret. A slim, leather-bound journal tucked under his mattress. Hajime never saw the pages, but sometimes he caught the faint scent of ink and something strangely sweet whenever Nagito passed by, like the ghost of words he wasn't meant to read.

And though Hajime never admitted it, he sometimes imagined the things Nagito might be writing.

Even if the world calls me worthless, I'd still gamble everything just to stand by your side.

The thought stuck in his headlike a curse, like a prayer he couldn't shake.

~+~

The days blurred together: quiet stretches of silence broken by sharp comments, stares that lingered longer than they should, and an invisible line of wagers both of them kept making without saying a word. Hajime told himself he hated it, hated Nagito, hated how he made him feel like glass with every glance.

But at night, when the wing was asleep under the drone of the lights, Hajime found himself tracing Nagito's handwriting from memory  into his notebook margins, reshaping his anger and fear into something more fragile.

I don't want to lose this. Whatever this is. Even if it kills me.

~+~

Everything unraveled the afternoon the program glitched.

A corrupted file, a sudden cascade of errors, and then the central display lit up with what was never meant to be seen: everyone's private files bleeding into the open.

Hajime froze as his words, his words, splashed across the screen:

You drive me insane, but I can't decide if I want to run from you... or toward you.

But not before Nagito's journal entries had already been thrown into the light:

Even if the world calls me worthless, I'd still gamble everything just to stand by your side.

Whispers surged through the room, but Hajime only saw Nagito. His wide eyes locked onto him, unflinching and unbearably raw. For a breathless second, Hajime thought the entire world might come crashing down around them.

Then Nagito smiled. Not the casual kind, not the teasing curve of his lips Hajime was used to. This one was wildfire and rainstorm all at once, chaos and devotion tangled together.

"You wrote it," Nagito said quietly. And beneath those words, Hajime could hear the truth: I already knew.

Hajime's chest squeezed tight. Panic and relief collided until he couldn't tell one from the other. He wanted to cover his notebook, wanted to bolt. Instead, he stayed. Met Nagito's gaze head-on. And to his own shock, he let a small smile break through.

"You're insane," he muttered, voice rough. "Absolutely, dangerously insane."

"And you," Nagito whispered, leaning close enough and Hajime could feel the tremble in his breath, "are no different."

They lingered like that, caught in the quiet chaos between them, a balance of fear and something too sharp to name. The glitch hadn't ruined them. If anything, it had forced the truth out into the open, the truth they'd both been too afraid to put into words.

And in that strange, electric silence, Hajime realized he didn't want to run anymore. He wanted to step closer. Even if it meant gambling everything on someone as reckless as Nagito.

Because some risks were worth everything.

Chapter Text

The demon bled shadows when Rumi cut it open. Its blood wasn't red, it was smoke, curling upward like the exhaust of a dying engine. The thing screeched, barbed limbs raking the walls of the abandoned theater they had cornered it in.

The stage lights flickered on, though the theater had been dead for years. Rows of ruined seats faced the spectacle, as if an invisible audience was waiting for the carnage to play out.

"Lights, camera, fuck you," Rumi muttered, her blade catching another swipe. She moved like broken glass, sharp, unpredictable, always on the verge of shattering but never quite giving way.

Jinu wasn't far. His fists glowed faintly, a rhythm pulsing through his veins, the way his music always did. He struck the demon once, and its jaw split open like rotten fabric.

But this thing was different. It didn't bleed to death; it feasted on silence, on things left unsaid. And with each strike, Rumi felt her chest tighten, as though every sarcastic remark she'd bitten back, every late-night thought she'd buried in her notes app, was being dragged into the open.

The demon turned its hollow eyes toward her and spoke in a voice that wasn't its own.

"You want him."

Her grip faltered. Just a half-second. Just enough for its claws to graze her arm. Pain split her skin, warm blood dripping down her sleeve.

"Shut the fuck up," she spat, forcing steel into her voice. But the words stuck to her throat like glue.

Behind her, Jinu froze too. The demon's body rippled, and from its throat came a sound Rumi had never heard before, Jinu's voice, half-singing, half-breaking:

"You're the lyric I never finished."

Her stomach dropped. She'd read his notebooks once, by accident, pages filled with lyrics crossed out, abandoned, burned at the edges like they'd been too raw to keep. That line had been one of them.

And now it was alive.

The theater roared with whispers. Unspoken things. Rumi's notes, her confessions, her goddamn weakness, all scrawled across the invisible walls. He's reckless, infuriating... the only one I trust when everything's falling apart.

Her words. Her handwriting. Vomited into the air by this parasite.

The demon laughed, its chest swelling with its shame. "Your silence is my feast. Keep hiding, keep choking, and I'll grow fat while you starve."

Jinu's fists clenched, trembling. "Don't listen."

"Easy for you to say," Rumi snapped, her voice cracking. "You weren't the one who just got publicly humiliated by your own fucking phone notes."

He almost smiled, pained, but real. Even bleeding, even cornered, she found a way to snarl through it. That was Rumi. That was why he-

No. Not now.

The demon lunged again. Jinu blocked the strike with his forearm, skin splitting under the impact, bone rattling. Pain sang through his body, but he didn't care. "Rumi!" he barked. "Look at me, not it!"

Her eyes flicked up, wild and furious.

"Do you trust me?" he demanded.

The answer should've been obvious. But the weight of it hit like a blade through her ribs. Trust was easy in battle, instinctual, unspoken. But this wasn't about the fight. This was about the part of her that had written you're the only one I can't lose and locked it behind a passcode.

The demon screeched, growing larger, feeding on the hesitation. Its claws scraped the floor, carving lines through wood and stone.

Rumi's jaw clenched. Blood dripped from her arm, painting her blade red. She spat the truth out like it was poison.

"You're reckless, you're fucking infuriating... and you're the only one I trust to watch my back when everything's falling apart."

The words echoed, burning. The demon shrieked, not in triumph this time, but in agony, its body unraveling like wet paper.

It staggered, smoke pouring from its mouth. Jinu didn't hesitate. His fist slammed into its core, his voice steady, raw:

"I've fought demons before... but you're the only one I'd let possess my heart."

The theater went silent.

The demon split apart, unraveling into ash that drifted across the stage like confetti at the world's cruelest concert. The air stank of iron and rot. The spotlights sputtered out, plunging them into darkness.

Rumi's knees gave way, and she pressed her hand against her bleeding arm. Her breath shook. She wanted to scream, to laugh, to collapse.

Instead, she muttered, "That was the cheesiest fucking thing I've ever heard."

Jinu sat beside her, his knuckles torn, his shirt soaked in blood. "You'll live."

"You planning on serenading every monster we fight from now on?"

"Only the ones that matter."

Silence stretched. Not heavy anymore. Just... there.

Rumi leaned her head back against the broken stage wall, eyes closing. Her body hurt, her mind burned, and yet, she felt lighter. Exposed, yeah. Humiliated, sure. But lighter.

Jinu let the quiet settle too. His hand brushed against hers, not holding, not asking. Just there. A presence. A constant.

The theater was empty. The demon was gone.

But for once, neither of them felt alone.

Chapter Text

The scenario ended in silence. No cheering system message, no sudden congratulatory screen. Just the metallic tang of blood still hanging in the air, broken bodies scattered like discarded dice across the battlefield.

Dokja sat on the cracked asphalt, fingers smeared with red that wasn't all his own. For once, Joonghyuk wasn't swinging his sword, wasn't shouting commands, wasn't glaring at the world as if he could kill it by sheer will. He was simply... there. Alive. Breathing. Staring into the hollow sky with that heavy weight in his chest, only Dokja seemed to notice.

It should have been peace. But peace was crueler than war. Peace meant time. Time to think. Time to remember. Time to write the things you'll never say.

Dokja's phone screen glowed faintly in the darkness. A draft. Another. A hundred unsent messages.

You were never just a character to me... but I'm still not sure if I'm real enough for you.

 

He typed, erased. Types again. Cowardice disguised as caution.

Across from him, Joonghyuk hunched over his regression notes. Not a single page was clean; every margin was clogged with scrawled curses, strategies, reminders, and beneath them, something raw. Words never meant to be seen. Words torn from a heart he'd never admit he had.

You're annoying. Reckless. Infuriating. And I'd tear the world apart before I let it take you from me.

 

The notes shook with the weight of his grip. His knuckles were still raw from where they'd split monsters apart, skin flayed open, tendons aching. None of it compared to the thought of Dokja's body lying still.

And then it happened.

The system glitched. A crackling distortion ripped across the sky, jagged pixels shredding reality like flesh beneath a blade. Dokja's phone buzzed violently, his drafts flickering on and off. Joonghyuk's regression notebook dissolved at the edges, his scrawls bleeding ink like open veins.

A system error. Not both of them. Just one. One of them would be reset. Erased. Torn from this loop as if they never existed.

The battlefield quaked. The corpses of monsters twitched in spasms, glitching. Some exploded, spraying gore across the cracked ground. Dokja's clothes soaked it in, warm blood seeping into the seams. He didn't flinch. He only stared at Joonghyuk.

For once, Joonghyuk wasn't moving toward the threat. He was moving toward him. His sword dropped with a clang, forgotten, his hand gripping Dokja's arm hard enough to bruise.

"Not you," Joonghyuk said, voice hoarse. "It won't be you."

The ground buckled. The error lashed out in jagged arcs, severing the air, cutting soldiers in half. The stench of burning flesh rose as reality itself sliced through them like a sadistic blade. One man screamed until his lungs collapsed into meat.

Dokja didn't move. He couldn't. Because Joonghyuk's eyes were on him like knives, like vows, like chains.

"Joonghyuk," Dokja said, blood in his throat. He coughed it out, red splattering the screen of his phone. "It might be me."

"No."

The word was sharp enough to cut steel.

And then the system spoke:

[Error. Reset Candidate: Kim Dokja.]

 

The glitch wrapped around him, red threads of corrupted code biting into his skin. It burned like acid, tearing through muscle, ripping away the edges of his form. His blood sprayed onto Joonghyuk's hands, hot, sticky, real.

Dokja laughed, bitter. "Figures."

Joonghyuk's grip didn't falter. His eyes, wild with fury, caught the shards of broken light. He looked like he was about to kill a god.

And maybe he would.

"Dokja," he rasped. "Listen to me." His hand, still shaking, reached for his notebook, already half-erased, smeared with glitch static. His scrawled vow burned as if branded into the air.

"I will find you," Joonghyuk said, voice cracking with the weight of a thousand regressions. "I don't care how many loops it takes. I don't care if I burn the world into ash. I will tear apart every scenario until you're back."

The code tightened around Dokja, slicing deeper. His skin peeled into light, his bones cracked like porcelain under strain. He could barely breathe. Barely hold onto anything. Except for the drafts on his phone. Except for the words he'd never dared to say.

He thumbed the message. Sent it. Even though he knew Joonghyuk would never see it.

You were never just a character to me... but I'm still not sure if I'm real enough for you.

 

The screen cracked. The phone disintegrated with him.

Joonghyuk screamed his name, raw and violent, the kind of scream that made corpses twitch. His blade rose, swung, and cut into the sky itself. Monsters exploded into gore, the system shrieked as if in pain, and Joonghyuk's body became nothing but violence and desperation.

But it wasn't enough.

Dokja shattered into fragments of code, blood, and light. Gone.

The battlefield was silent again. Silent, except for the echo of Joonghyuk's vow scratched into the ruins of his regression notes, and the taste of blood thick on his tongue.

He picked up what was left of Dokja's phone, only dust. Only nothing.

Still, he spoke into the void:

"You're not gone. Not from me."

And in a broken timeline, somewhere between life and reset, Dokja smiled bitterly at the words he would never hear.

Chapter Text

The first time Ko saw him, he was half-buried in ruin. Black feathers strewn like dead leaves across the ground, torn wings twitching under the weight of broken stone. The villagers called him a demon, a cursed thing, an omen of war. She called him Acturos. Not because she knew his true name, she didn't, but because when she whispered the syllables in the hollow of her chest, it felt right, like a song that had always existed and only now found its voice.

For years, he never drew closer than the treeline. Always there, always watching. His body was a cathedral of scars. His silence was both shield and prison.

Ko carried the song of the realm, a fragile thread of melody that kept the ground steady and the rivers flowing. But the curse came as all curses do, not in thunder, but in a whisper. A sickness in her throat, a tightening each time she tried to sing. Her song cracked. The rivers shuddered. The world bent under silence that was not natural but forced.

And still, Acturos watched.

It wasn't until her knees struck the dirt one night, blood staining her lips as she choked on silence where music should have been, that he stepped out from the shadows. His wings stretched wide, blacker than midnight, yet each feather carried streaks of silver as though the moon had bled across them.

"You shouldn't," Ko rasped, voice breaking into a cough. "They'll see you. They'll kill you."

"They can try," he said, voice like gravel dragged through ash. Then, softer: "You make me want to be gentle in a world that only taught me how to be cruel."

Her heart stilled at his words. Her song, her curse, ached against the cage of her ribs.

~+~

The curse revealed itself in teeth and claws. Shadows rose, tangible, things with too many mouths. They feasted on silence, growing fatter with every note Ko lost. Villagers screamed in the night as black tendrils crawled under doors, splitting bodies with wet, tearing sounds. Blood ran thick in the fields.

Acturos did not hesitate. His claws, once meant for mercy, long ago, before his fall, tore through the beasts with obscene violence. Black ichor sprayed across his chest as he ripped one apart from jaw to spine. His face was calm, detached, as though he were merely peeling fruit. Yet Ko saw the truth in his eyes: every strike carried weight, a hatred for the cruelty the world had made of him.

Ko pressed her hand against her throat, where a phantom chain burned. No sound came out, no song to stitch the torn realm. She reached for him instead, trembling fingers brushing blood and shadow from his feathers.

"You're not unworthy," she whispered, though the words scratched like broken glass inside her throat. "I pretend not to notice how you hide your heart, but I do. And if I could, I'd curl up in your silence until you believed you weren't unworthy of love."

Acturos froze. For a moment, his bloodied hand trembled. For one moment, the mask cracked.

And then-

The shadows came harder. A wave of them. Screeching, gnashing, a black sea of hunger. They tore through flesh indiscriminately. Villagers died screaming, their limbs torn off in sprays of gore. Acturos roared, wings snapping open, catching the tide head-on. He was a storm of violence, ripping, clawing, staining the earth in black and red.

Ko fell to her knees, voiceless, powerless. She pressed her hands to her chest as though she could force the song back, force the melody through the curse. Nothing came. Only silence. Only blood.

~+~

When it was over, the village was bone and ash. The air stank of iron and decay. Acturos stood amid the ruin, feathers slick with gore, chest heaving. His eyes found hers, and in them she saw something break, not his rage, but his distance.

He walked to her slowly, like a man condemned, like each step might shatter the fragile hope between them. He sank to his knees before her. His claws, still dripping, curled against the dirt as if ashamed.

"Do you see me now?" he asked. "Do you see what I am? This is why I never come closer. This is why I-"

She pressed her bloodied hand to his face. Quiet, steady, unafraid.

"I see you," she said. No voice, only breath. But he understood.

And in that silence, something shifted. Not the curse, not the blood-soaked earth, but him. Acturos, the fallen, the cruel, the shadow-winged guardian, leaned forward until his forehead rested against hers. His breath shook. His claws softened against her waist, careful, reverent.

For the first time, he believed her.

For the first time, he was gentle.

Chapter Text

I wrote it in the comments but I decided to place it here as well.

Hi everyone! It's Yang here, this is about the latest chapter. All I can say is I want to sincerely apologize. I did use AI to polish the chapter, and I realize that it took away the stuff you liked about my stories (if any). I understand why you're disappointed, and I take full responsibility. I'll be more honest with my writing moving forward and focus on writing on my own once again.

To the people who want to stop reading my stories due to this, it's totally fine. Thank you for enjoying my stories up to that point and I'm sorry for disappointing you like this

Thank you for reading, if you're ever see this, and I want to end this by saying I'm incredibly sorry again

Chapter Text

The neon chat flew like a river of noise across the screen, hearts and emotes and "MARRIED ALREADY" spamming until the words blurred into static. Vena adjusted the mic, pretending she didn't notice. Her wings, digital fiery, rendered in impossible shades of orange and gold, curled close, a phoenix dressing itself in armor.

Dark leaned back in his chair, a lazy grin curling like smoke. His model's sharp coat and fedora framed the perfect picture of a noir detective, though his real voice cracked through with too much warmth to ever be as cold as his avatar.

"So tell me, Vena," he drawled, cool as a cigarette drag, "what's it like getting caught red-handed? Tripped over your own words again. Suspicious."

She scoffed, rolling her eyes. "Suspicious? Please. If anyone's suspicious here, it's the guy hiding his entire personality under a trench coat."

The chat exploded. 

[LMAO]

[Married couple energy intensifies]

[JUST KISS ALREADY]

Dark chuckled, the sound low, unhurried, almost dangerous. "Mm. I'll take the coat slander. Better than getting read like an open case file." He tapped his desk like it was evidence. "Which, by the way, you're making far too easy tonight."

Her cheeks, real, not rendered, betrayed her first. The camera's studio lights painted a faint heat across her skin, blush deepening no matter how sharp she made her voice. "You're insufferable, you know that? Absolutely insufferable."

"Mm. You say that," he purred, leaning forward as though to whisper, "but you haven't left the call."

She opened her mouth, then shut it. Her model twitched in silence, the phoenix feathers rippling faintly.

The chat devoured the pause like sharks.

[MOMENT MOMENT MOMENT]

[VENAS BLUSHIN]

[SHE FELL FOR IT]

Vena snapped her fingers, conjuring a flame effect on the stream that curled in the air like smoke. "Keep talking, detective. I'll roast you alive. Pretty sure your smirk isn't flameproof."

Dark only smirked wider. "Pretty sure it isn't supposed to be."

~+~

The stream ended hours later. The "Thanks for watching" outro jingled in cheery tones that didn't match the silence that followed. Both sat in their separate rooms, the glow of monitors fading into the real dark.

Vena pulled her headphones off, letting them drop to her desk with a thud. Her heart was still hammering like she'd sprinted. She told herself it was adrenaline, a performance high, the chaos of chat eating her alive. She told herself it wasn't because of him.

Her phone screen lit with notifications. Twitter clips are already spreading. "Dark x Vena real???" is trending in the sidebar. She groaned, rubbing her temples.

Then the ping. A private message.

Dark: Nice job not incinerating me on live. You're getting better.

 

She stared. Typed. Erased. Types again. Finally:

Vena: Don't flatter yourself. I held back because it'd be too easy.

 

Another ping.

Dark: Oh? Then I'll keep pushing. Makes the game interesting.

She set the phone down because she threw it. Her reflection in the black screen was smiling, soft, unguarded, traitorous.

~+~

They met again in the studio a week later, recording for a sponsor segment. Cameras off, no chat spamming hearts, no avatars between them. Just him, slouched against the wall, coffee in hand, coat draped like a storm cloud, and her, hair tied up, hoodie instead of feathers.

The quiet was worse than the noise.

"You're quieter without them watching," Dark said, not looking at her. His real voice was rougher, deeper, but still carried that same razor-edge amusement.

"Maybe because you don't have a thousand people simping for you in my ear," Vena shot back, fiddling with her script.

He chuckled. "Fair." A sip of coffee. A pause. Then, softer, "You blush easier in person."

Her head snapped up. "Excuse me?"

"You think the lights hide it. They don't." His eyes finally lifted, pinning her like an interrogation lamp. "I notice things."

The words cut closer than any teasing remark on the stream. She felt her throat dry. Her instinct was to snap, to throw fire, to bury the heat rising in her chest. But he was already looking away again, as if he hadn't just peeled her open with a single sentence.

She hated him for it. Hated him, and hated herself more for the way her pulse betrayed her.

~+~

Neither of them said what they wanted. They never did. Instead, their truths bled out in private notes:

Dark's, in the draft folder of an abandoned document:

You're impossible. You laugh like you're made of starlight, but you burn like fire when I get too close. I'd tell you how much I like dancing on that edge, between your glare and your smile, but then you'd never let me live it down. So instead I'll just keep teasing, and hope you never notice how badly I want you to stay.

Vena's, tucked in the memo app between grocery lists and half-finished lyrics:

You think you're clever, always hiding behind your smirk, your riddles, your damn coat. But you make my heart race more than I'd ever admit. I hate how easy it is for you to get under my skin, and I hate even more how much I don't actually hate it.

Two unsent messages. Two truths trapped in silence.

And when their eyes met again, just before the cameras rolled, both wore their usual masks: his crooked grin, her sharp glare.

But the silence between them pulsed louder than chat ever could.