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Toge opens his eyes slowly.
He can’t see well, his vision is blurry.
He hurts.
Mostly his head, but his body aches as well and he’s on the ground but he can’t remember why. There’s cool grass under his cheek and under the arm outstretched in front of him. There’s something dark on his arm, dripping down over pale skin.
Blood, he thinks, dully. It’s blood.
He blinks, trying to resolve his vision, and the dark smear on his forearm becomes a bright splash of red from a cut above his elbow. Dazed, he tries to move but his head protests and his ears ring. He has trouble gathering his thoughts.
Beyond his arm, another shape resolves. Toge’s breath quickens, eyes widening. A wounded note rises in his throat.
Koharu.
She’s on her side, facing away from him but he can see the blood staining the back of her shirt. She is the youngest of his ‘babies’, as he calls them, the young Guides that he meets with for training a few times a week. Most are still new recruits, still understanding their own powers and where they might fit into the structure of Command.
Koharu is only eighteen.
And he remembers. They had been meditating on the training grounds together, sitting cross-legged in the grass, enjoying the early summer sun. In between exercises, they’d been chatting and eating a few snacks, Hideo telling them about an Esper he’d been asked to meet with—
Hideo. Toge pushes himself up onto his wounded arm, searching for the young boy only to find him sprawled out nearby. There’s no visible wounds but the other Guide is unconscious. All of Toge’s students are laid out, some grazed and scraped by debris that lays everywhere, a fine dust in the air that makes Toge’s eyes sting. It takes a moment for him to realize it’s all from a nearby shed that looks like it exploded, little left of it but smoldering rubble and a blackened foundation. Were they attacked? Was Command under attack?
Then the ringing in his ears lessens just enough for him to hear muffled voices, some calling out, some shouting. He senses Espers converging on their location, their bright auras like fireflies in his shocked mind. He tries to sit up, clenching the tail end of a groan between his teeth.
A voice sounds just behind him, eerily close and strangely lilting.
“Oh, you’re still awake.”
Turning his head feels a little like moving underwater, his stomach sinking as his gaze comes to rest on a lanky, blue-haired Esper with mismatched eyes. Toge has never spoken to him before but he knows who he is—Mahito, strong but a loose cannon, manipulative and cunning, veering ever towards madness. He’d had a near death experience with a curse when he was fifteen and, as far as Toge understood, he’d never been quite right since.
Command, of course, had thought to leash him like a rabid dog, train him to fight curses, despite the risk. Toge had never liked the feel of the man—like a sheen of oil over a black sea, hiding the treacherous depths below, one match strike away from losing it entirely.
Maybe this is it, Toge thinks.
His muddled mind slowly notices the blood on Mahito’s fingers, under his nails. The Esper looks pale, cold, like a walking corpse, eyes alight with a crazed fervor. He smiles wide at Toge, almost maniacal.
“You must be strong to withstand my power,” he says. “You can feel it, can’t you? Eating away at you?”
A shiver works its way down Toge’s spine. He can. It’s all around him, all around this area of the training grounds. It was what had downed all of his baby Guides—not the explosion, that was most likely just a side effect—a dark, angry corrosion that pulses like a heartbeat, gnawing at their mental shields like a virus. The young Guides would have had no defense against it, they were still too new to serious personal shielding, but Toge’s are stronger, though even he can feel his slowly dissolving under Mahito’s poison.
“I can feel it, too,” Mahito continues, an unsettling laugh escaping him. “It’s been inside too long. It wants out.”
Toge’s stomach drops.
“Inumaki!”
Toge shifts onto his knees, head turning again to find Yuuji running into view, out of breath and white-faced as he takes in the scene. His aura shifts from wavery to solid as the earth as he takes in the unconscious Guides, stone-hard eyes lifting to Mahito.
“You did this?”
Toge feels cold suddenly, goosebumps raising on his skin. Yuuji is normally so easy going, so flexible and good-natured even when out in the field. This is the first time Toge has ever felt actual killing intent from him and it worries him. A fight between Espers won’t end in anything good. Where is Megumi?
As it turns out, he doesn’t have time to contemplate the missing Guide, however, because Mahito chooses to lunge past him, a crazed look in his eyes, cackling like a mad man as he moves towards Itadori.
Toge doesn’t think, he reacts. He can’t let this man hurt anyone else.
He throws himself at Mahito’s feet, wrapping his arms around the Esper’s left leg, halting him in his tracks.
The pain is absolute and immediate.
Mahito’s caustic power courses through Toge like fire, every nerve alight. He screams with it, writhing, but he doesn’t let go, can’t let go. He doesn’t understand how they got here but he’s the only Guide Yuuji has at the moment and Toge’s put down stronger Espers than Mahito.
Yuuta.
He fights, mentally pushing back against the torrent of Mahito’s power. He can sense Yuuji running towards them, shouting his name. Toge only has a few seconds before his shields will be gone completely, pulverized by the psychic acid leaking from Mahito’s psyche. He tightens his arms around the Esper’s leg, somehow shaping the scream in his mouth into words as blood wells over his lips.
“Don’t move!”
Mahito freezes up, shuddering in place as he strains against the guiding command that weakens his muscles and locks his limbs. A garbled wail of frustration escapes the Esper, eyes roving wildly before Yuuji’s empowered fist slams into his face and the sickening crack of bones breaking fills Toge’s ringing ears.
Mahito goes down hard, unconscious and limp in the dirt. With him goes the clawing pain, and Toge’s body and mind collapse, his sight growing dim. He feels Yuuji grab him, the younger Esper pulling Toge’s limbs away from Mahito, one calloused hand patting Toge’s cheek.
“Hey, Inumaki, hey! Stay awake okay?” His fingers fumble at Toge’s neck to check the fluttering pulse there. “You gotta stay awake or Okkotsu is gonna kill me,” he mutters worriedly. Teetering on the verge of passing out, Toge manages a weak smile for him, fingers signing a word in aching slowness against his chest.
Sorry.
And then he, too, drops into the comforting dark and knows no more.
Yuuta teleports into insanity.
He’d been on the other side of the compound meeting with Shoko when they’d heard an explosion and the little bundle of colors and emotions in his head that was Toge dimmed. Like a shadow passing in front of the sun, it had chilled him, an old fear rising to choke him with a voice that said you’re too late again.
His teleport is reckless, barely sticking the landing into the courtyard where Espers and Guides alike mill like a disturbed colony of ants. People are shouting, some looked dazed, and security officers in Command black are everywhere. Yuuta ignores it, fixated on finding Toge, holding his mental connection to his Guide carefully with his power. There’s not much feedback from Toge and that worries him. Normally Toge’s a star in the back of his mind, bright and glowing, Yuuta’s true North, swirling with a depth most people never get to see. Now, though, all Yuuta senses from him is… static.
He quickens his pace, chest tightening.
Espers move aside for him as he lopes to the training grounds. Toge had a session with his new Guides today and that’s normally where he takes them. There’s a crowd when Yuuta arrives though, both of security and Espers, and his stomach drops.
He catches sight of Nanami, tall and imposing, his expression hard as security officers lift a gurney with an unconscious blue-haired Esper. Yuuta recognizes him and his world pulses, the air going brittle and cold. There are lead handcuffs on Mahito’s wrists and his face is a mess, bloody and swollen. Yuuta can sense the remnants of his twisted power all around. Nanami’s own power is activated, seemingly ready to put Mahito down again should he wake.
Yuuta’s breath fogs in the air as he breathes out, the temperature dropping around him as his energy rises in response to his inner turmoil.
“Where is Toge?”
Everyone around him seems to pause.
All except one.
“Okkotsu!”
Yuuta turns and Espers move out of the path of his gaze to reveal Itadori about fifteen feet away, the younger Esper on his knees in the grass, half holding an unconscious Toge in his arms. Yuuta’s Guide is limp, pale as a ghost, and there’s dried blood on his chin and neck, garishly red against his clammy skin. His silver head is tipped back over Yuuji’s arm, so impossibly still that Yuuta stops breathing in response.
Great claw marks tear across Rika’s body, rending flesh and bone. He’d been too late, always too late, and all he can do is try and hold her together, but she’s already gone. She’s left him there, alone, for the first time since they were children, and his grief and pain and anger are an endless well, overflowing—
Maki sees the moment Okkotsu loses all rational thought and all hell breaks loose in answer.
The earth literally groans underneath her feet, shuddering as Yuuta’s power unleashes like an invisible wave crashing down on them, flooding the entire area with kinetic energy. It’s everywhere, suffocating and immense, as heavy as a mountain. It tries to steal the air from her lungs, to turn her muscles to jelly, but her shields are up and she pushes back against it, grim and determined.
Across from her, Yuuji is shouting over a maelstrom of noise that lives only in their minds.
“He’s still breathing! He’s alive, Okkotsu!”
Yuuta’s eyes are dark and dead, as cold as ice and just as unseeing. She’s sure he can’t hear them. She watches as Okkotsu, looking eerily calm, draws his katana from the sheath on his back, his empty gaze fixed on Itadori—the person too close to his wounded Guide.
Fuck.
Nearby, trees on the edge of the grounds… burst, exploding from the inside out as if flash frozen, splinters of wood falling like a shower of rain. Espers close by pull back from the effects of Okkotsu’s power, some carrying the young Guides that had been felled previously by Mahito, protecting their charges with their bodies. The guards responsible for Mahito retreat as well, including Nanami who unshoulders a long gun he’d been carrying and hefts it with a short throw over to her.
It’s a tranquilizer gun.
She hurriedly checks it’s loaded, grunting against the weight of Yuuta’s unchecked power, glancing up to see him advancing on Itadori slowly, sword pointed away and at the ground as his each step flares red with visible raw energy.
She yells at Yuuji as she chambers a shot. “Put Toge down and get out of there!”
“Just leave him?!” Yuuji yells back, sounding scandalized. He’s watching Okkotsu’s slow approach like someone watching the coming of their own execution but he’s still holding the unconscious Inumaki tightly, protectively.
“Yes! He’s gone feral, you idiot!”
She puts the butt of the gun into her shoulder and peers down the sight. She gets it, she does. This doesn’t look like the case of a textbook feral Esper. Everything they’re taught is that feral Espers are pure rage—screaming, fiery, rage monsters that want to fight and destroy everything around them out of pain or fear or retribution.
But not so with Okkotsu.
She knows him well enough now that she can see it, has seen it, sometimes, in the way he fights on the battlefield. Okkotsu’s rage burns cold, right down to the bone. He will never scream with fury or erupt in a rampage.
He will simply kill them all with a single, clean sword stroke and flick their blood from his blade after without batting an eyelash.
No, Okkotsu Yuuta is feral and the only person that could guide him down safely is currently out of commission in Itadori’s arms.
Just fuck them in particular, right?
Yuuji screeches her name in panic as Yuuta nears, sword lifting. “Maki!”
She breathes out and pulls the trigger.
The tranq syringe hits Yuuta in the back, beneath his shoulder, and he stills when he feels the impact, his head turning to look over at her. His power roils around her like unseen fire as she chambers another round, looking him right in the eye.
Come and get me.
He launches himself towards her in an instant, as fast and silent as a lightning strike before the thunder, blade leveled sideways for a slashing strike.
She shoots him again.
This time the dart gets him in the meat of his arm and there’s an audible sound as the pressurized cartridge injects its contents into the muscle there. Maki throws herself out of the way as he crashes down nearly where she was standing, his legs finally giving out from under him after two full doses.
The thick energy smothering them evaporates and Maki actually feels her body sway forward and back with the sudden absence of it. She takes a long, full breath and casts a glance over at Itadori who is getting to his feet, Toge in his arms.
“You okay?”
“I think so,” he says, sounding a little shaky. “He really was going to kill me, wasn’t he?”
She sighs, shouldering the gun. “He was if you were going to continue to just sit there like a fool,” she grumbles, starting towards Yuuta. She bends down to check him but he’s completely out, his pulse slow but steady.
“Don’t take it personally,” she adds, quietly. “Without Toge, he’s not in his right mind. He would have killed me, too, for trying to stop him.”
The worst of it is she couldn’t really even blame Yuuta. She doesn’t know the horror of losing one Guide, let alone the terror of possibly losing a second. The idea is so unfathomable, so overwhelming, that her brain shies away from even contemplating it. Even now, Nobara is in the back of her head, stalking her way and feeling both particularly frustrated and worried.
What would it be like if that spark of life, of connection, was just suddenly snuffed out?
Maki’s mouth presses into a thin line.
She thinks that sort of pain would drive just about anyone mad.
Yuuta has a headache when he wakes.
It throbs behind his eyes as he peers blearily around the room, trying to get his bearings. He’s laying on a hospital bed in what he recognizes is the medical ward—a small, drab room empty of decoration, with a window to his right and a curtain to his left that has been pulled across half the room to give him some privacy. There’s an empty chair next to his bed for visitors and the quiet beeping of the monitors tracking his heart beat.
He’s hooked up to an IV, a saline drip near the railing of his bed, but he doesn’t feel as badly as he usually does after a hard fight. He doesn’t seem to have any wounds, either, just that pulsing headache that makes it hard to think right. He doesn’t remember how he got here.
“I see you’re with us again,” Shoko says, stepping into his field of view in her white lab coat, a clipboard under her arm. She looks a little tired, her expression drawn as she looks him up and down. “How do you feel? Any pain?”
He shakes his head, swallowing against his dry throat as Shoko picks up a water bottle with a straw from his bedside table, steadying it to let him take a drink.
“What happened?” he croaks, wincing at the sound of his voice. A lingering sense of dread suddenly fills his mind and he looks around, anxiety spiking. “Where’s Toge?”
Shoko pauses. “You don’t remember?”
“I…” He struggles to think back. “I was here. I had a meeting with you, we…” He frowns, his brows drawing together even as his heart monitor beeps warningly. “Toge was here, too, I know it.” He looks up at Shoko. “Why can’t I remember?”
“There was a situation earlier,” Shoko says. “An Esper—Mahito—had a full mental breakdown and lost control, escaping his handlers. Many Espers and Guides were injured and the compound suffered some damage.” Yuuta understands now why she seems tired but there’s only one question burning across his mind.
“Toge,” he pleads.
Shoko sighs and pulls the room dividing curtain back, revealing Toge in an identical hospital bed on the other side. Yuuta bites off a gasp, heart leaping, and he sharply disentangles himself from the machines trapping him, sending alarm bells ringing until Shoko leans over to silence them as he stumbles from his bed to reach Toge’s.
His Guide seems to be unconscious, hooked up to the same monitoring equipment Yuuta had been, with an IV and a nasal cannula. He looks small and vulnerable lying there, skin pale with dark bruises under his eyes. There are some bandages around his arms to treat minor wounds or cuts. His breathing seems shallow, too, with a slight wheeze that Yuuta dislikes immensely. Toge’s hand is cold as Yuuta takes his right one in both of his, trying to press his own warmth and strength into the other boy.
Their bond is quiet, sleeping.
Yuuta hates it.
“What’s wrong with him?” he asks, urgently, searching Toge’s beloved face for any sign of awareness. There’s nothing.
“Physically, not much, but he’s suffered major mental trauma. He quenched Mahito in the height of his insanity and, as I’m sure you’re aware, Mahito’s powers are abrasive and can cause psychic damage.”
“Especially through Touch,” Yuuta recites numbly, remembering the report all high level Espers had been required to read on Command’s mad dog.
And Toge excels at Touch.
Shoko nods. “Toge held on to him long enough for Itadori to knock him out.”
Yuuta closes his eyes briefly, pressing his forehead to the back of Toge’s hand, trying to even out his breathing. “Prognosis?”
“Rest and time,” Shoko replies, but he hears something in her voice that makes him look over at her. She catches his gaze. “And maybe someone willing to go in and bring him back.”
Yuuta’s eyebrows lift. “You mean into his mind? That would help?” He and Toge mind walk together quite a bit. It’s comforting and meditative and it’s as close as two people can possibly get without losing their sense of self. They use it as a tool to communicate and process their inner thoughts and emotions. If Toge needs Yuuta to come get him, to show him he’s safe again, Yuuta will do it in a heartbeat.
“I think so. There’s no physical reason for him to still be unconscious so it appears the problem is mental—he’s retreated into himself for protection. If he knows you’re there, I think he’ll come out again.” She shrugs. “It’s a little unconventional. Our other choice is to wait and let him wake when he’s ready.”
“No, I’ll do it,” he says, firmly. He can feel Shoko assessing him.
“Maki had to shoot you twice when you went feral over Toge’s condition. You took two doses of tranquilizer, Okkotsu, enough to drop a bull. You can rest a little first, if you like. Inumaki’s not in any danger right now.”
Scenes, pieces of memory flash before his eyes—Yuuji shouting, Toge’s limp body, the endless cold of the void. He pushes it aside, unable to think about it just then. He’s sure that later he will feel guilty for putting his friends through that, for losing control, but he can’t regret it either, not where it concerns his Guide.
“No,” he says, quietly. “I’m the one who’s dangerous without him. I’m going in.”
He pulls up the chair next to Toge’s bed and sits, leaning over the side to brush Toge’s silver hair back gently, sweeping his knuckles down the curve of his sleeping face.
“Hold on, baby,” he whispers to him. “I’m coming for you.”
The coast of Toge’s mindscape greets him as it always does—soft sand under his bare feet, warm water lapping around his ankles, a white moon rising over the sea. Yuuta is a little surprised at first, assuming there would be something blatantly wrong with the environment—a blood red sky maybe, or a salt flat where the sea should be—but he doesn’t notice anything out of the ordinary, beyond the lack of Toge’s presence with him.
At least, at first.
As he walks along the beach, leaving foot prints in the damp sand, he begins to realize there are things wrong around him. Small things. The one he notices first is the lack of stars. The moon shines brightly in the eternal night sky there, but the brush of diamond stars that normally grace the black are missing. Yuuta’s not sure why it bothers him so much except that the space feels empty in a way it never has before.
The most painful change, though, is the lighthouse.
When it comes into view on the rocky shore, Yuuta feels his heart clench. He comes to an abrupt stop. The lighthouse still stands tall and clear, towering over the waves breaking beneath it, but its light is out, its beacon gone dark.
Yuuta has never seen it unlit, not in all the times he’s walked here with Toge.
The lighthouse has always been, at least to Yuuta, the symbol of Toge’s guiding light. To no longer see it flaring out across the midnight sea, calling him home, makes a lump rise in his throat. He swallows against it and the burning in his eyes.
“It’s okay,” he says softly, both to himself and Toge, rubbing a hand across his face. “It’s okay. I’ll come to you this time.”
The sand of the beach slowly becomes a field of tall grass to Yuuta’s right, and he steps into it on a whim, letting his feet lead him. The grass is waist height and ripples in waves like a sea of its own, blown by a cool wind that tangles in Yuuta’s hair and clothes. He breathes in deep, soaking in the comfort he always feels when walking Toge’s mind, knowing he’s absolutely safe there despite the oddities he’s observed. If Toge’s protecting himself, it’s not from him.
As he walks, he notices a few other things. The field of grass gives way to a forest, one of the trees at the border tied with something bright blue. As Yuuta gets closer, he sees that it’s actually a turquoise scarf—the same one Toge had given him as a gift this last winter—tied around one of the branches. Yuuta reaches up to feel the soft wool and smiles, letting the fabric slip through his fingers.
“Go this way, Toge?” he murmurs, feeling encouraged.
The forest is dark and still, shafts of moonlight like silvered puddles on the mossy floor. Every time Yuuta feels like he might be losing his way, there’s something that catches his eye—a flicker from memory, a cherished item. His sheathed katana leaning against a slender elm shows him the way across a small stream. One memorable time it’s Rika’s ring, the one he still wears often around his neck under his clothes in remembrance, dangling from a delicate chain at the edge of a tree bough.
Yuuta can’t help but cup it gently in one palm, his chest tight. It’s not lost on him that all the things he’s seeing are his. Even this deep in Toge’s mind, it’s as if Toge is trying to protect what’s important to Yuuta.
“But you’re mine too, aren’t you, Toge?” he asks the quiet forest air. His voice drops, his expression open, yearning. “My most favorite thing.”
He goes on, patiently, steadily, following the path Toge has left for him, knowing that for anyone else this landscape would be a maze, ever-changing and confusing, hiding its heart. Yuuta passes through it like a dream, safeguarded from the labyrinth.
Time is strange when sharing a mind space, so he’s not sure how long it takes him—if he walks for mere moments or ages—but eventually the forest thins enough to reveal a small cottage. It looks like something out of an old picture book, its roof near covered in ivy, its wooden shutters thrown open, no glass in the windows. Flimsy curtains flutter with the breeze, a potted plant on the bare windowsill—for some reason it’s that small detail that makes Yuuta’s soul tremble in anticipation.
Toge is here.
This place is his, somehow, somewhere. Maybe from a special time in his childhood, a vacation home his parents took him to during the summers. Yuuta has never seen it before but the little cottage means something to Toge for it to be here like this, at the center of his mind. He wants to know everything about it, to have Toge tell him why it’s so cherished.
But more than that, he just wants Toge.
The inside is clean and cozy, with well-worn furniture, but Yuuta has eyes only for the bed near the open window. Toge is curled up in the middle of it on top of the blankets, his knees drawn up almost to his chest as if to make himself as small as possible. He looks to be sleeping, brow furrowed underneath his silver hair as if he can’t completely rest, his mouth parted slightly as he breathes.
On shaky legs, Yuuta stumbles to his bedside, his hands smoothing over Toge’s arms, his shoulders, his throat, unable to stop himself from touching. He repeats his Guide’s name over and over, mumbling, desperate to see those violet eyes.
“Toge, Toge, Toge… I’m here. I’m here.”
He repeatedly swipes his thumbs over Toge’s smooth cheeks, breathing a sigh of relief when pale lashes flutter and he’s greeted with a sleepy lavender gaze.
“Yuuta.” Toge’s voice is grainy and hoarse, as if he’s strained it in the real world. Yuuta inhales, knowing too well why that might be, but knowing also there’s nothing he can do about it here.
“Hi, sweetheart,” he says instead, brimming with love and utter relief. “I missed you.” He rests his palm on the side of Toge’s face, warmth spreading through him again when his Guide leans into his touch. “You’ve been sleeping awhile.”
Realization spreads over Toge’s face. “Mahito.”
His fingers curl into Yuuta’s shirt, tugging on it, and Yuuta goes easily, slipping down into the bed with Toge, their limbs entangling the moment he’s close enough. They rest their heads close together, gazing at each other, breathing the same breath.
“Mahito’s gone now,” Yuuta tells him firmly, leaving no room for doubt or fear. He links one hand with Toge’s, their fingers interlocking. “You’re safe.”
He can see Toge’s throat move as he swallows heavily. His eyes shine in the dim light. “It hurt.”
Yuuta’s sure his heart cracks in two. He lifts his free hand to smooth back Toge’s hair comfortingly, taking a moment to gather himself. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there,” he says lowly, achingly remorseful. So often the greatest curse of his life was just not being in the right place at the right time.
Toge nuzzles into his hand. “You’re here now,” he says.
Yuuta shifts forward, pulling Toge closer by the waist, enough to dip down and kiss him, a needy sound escaping him when his Guide immediately opens his mouth, welcoming him. It hasn’t been that long in reality but it feels like forever since he’s had this, the grounding anchor of Toge’s body, his touch, his taste, the sweet warmth of his power like a weighted blanket around them both.
“I love you so much,” he murmurs against Toge’s mouth between kisses. There are other things he wants to say—don’t scare me like that again, never leave me—but they’re selfish, possessive sentiments best left to the corners of his own mind. Not that Toge wouldn’t be receptive to them, but they’re unfair in that sometimes, in their line of work, a scare or a parting cannot be helped, and he never wants to burden Toge with promises that cannot be kept.
“I love you, too, Yuuta,” Toge whispers, fingers sliding up Yuuta’s neck into his dark hair, running his blunt nails lightly over his scalp in the way he knows Yuuta likes.
Yuuta exhales what feels like the weight of the world, a tension he hadn’t realized was there unwinding from him under Toge’s ministrations. His Guide is back. Yuuta’s energy, coiled hard and ready to strike ever since losing it on the training grounds, finally loosens, gentling at Toge’s slightest touch.
“Come home with me?” Yuuta asks, the words escaping him in a rush. As much as he adores the calm comfort of Toge’s mind, he wants to get his arms around him in the real world.
Toge nods against him and Yuuta smiles for what feels like the first time in forever, unbearably happy.
There’s just one thing they need to do first.
Between one moment and the next, they are back at the coast, at the foot of the lighthouse. Yuuta leans back to check the sky and is pleased to see tiny pinpoints of light reappearing overhead, one by one, as if an artist is painting them into existence by hand.
Said artist is standing next to him, head tilted as he examines the tower silently. Yuuta feels a curl of exhilaration when Toge finally steps forward and lays his hand against the stone, the breeze off the water dancing through his starlit hair and the hem of clothes.
He gazes up the length of the lighthouse and says only one word in his priceless voice.
“Shine.”
The moment Toge and Yuuta wake they’re accosted by Shoko and a few other medically-inclined Espers, most of them cooing over Toge—as Espers are want to do when a Guide is hurt—and running him through some tests to make sure he’s not suffering any lasting effects from his mental contact with Mahito.
Yuuta bears the flurry of attention with ill-concealed grace, keeping a tight rein on his overprotective streak as his Guide is poked and prodded, but it’s a grating atmosphere after the quiet of Toge’s mindscape.
When Toge starts to look drawn, the bruises under his eyes dark against his pale skin, that wheeze starting to come back when he breathes, Yuuta’s had enough. A tendril of his power lashes out and one of the monitoring screens cracks diagonally, spreading like a spiderweb, the whole thing going dark.
Shoko gives him an unamused look but ushers everyone else out of the room. From his bed, Toge signs gratefully behind her back.
Thank you.
“Well, that was totally unnecessary,” Shoko drawls, coming back to Toge’s bedside. Yuuta doesn’t bother trying to look even remotely regretful.
“Toge’s had a long day. He needs some rest,” he says, shortly, still running a little on edge. Toge reaches out his hand and Yuuta takes it with a squeeze, threading their fingers together.
“You as well,” Shoko mentions, dryly. “Don’t feel too bad though. Maki says she’s happy to shoot you any day of the week.” There’s a wicked gleam in her eyes that makes Yuuta’s shoulders slump in defeat. He really shouldn’t have broken her equipment.
Toge straightens on the edge of his hospital bed, startled. He releases Yuuta’s hand so he can sign quickly. You were shot? A pause as Toge’s eyes widen, the puzzle pieces falling together. Maki had to tranquilize you?
He looks a little horrified at the idea, likely remembering their first meeting. Yuuta hurries to reassure him.
“I’m okay!” He rubs the back of his neck, a little sheepish. “I didn’t… react well when I saw you unconscious after you helped take down Mahito.” Probably an understatement but it’s not like Yuuji and Maki are there to contradict him. “Bad memories,” he adds, quietly.
It really has been an extremely long day.
Toge looks somewhat mollified, though still troubled, brows drawn together. He wriggles his fingers at Yuuta and the Esper smiles, soft and weary, granting his Guide’s request to come close enough to touch.
Shoko watches them for a moment before giving an audible sigh. “Alright, get out of here, both of you. I’m putting you two on medical leave for the next three days. I do not want to see you back here before then. Get some rest.” Her gaze narrows suddenly. “Actual rest, Okkotsu.”
After a brief check on Toge’s students, Yuuta teleports them directly into the middle of their apartment living room, the two of them too tired to actually separate when they get there, just standing together, Toge pressed into his side with his arms around Yuuta’s waist.
Yuuta holds him close, swaying them a little from side to side for comfort, his head resting on top of Toge’s, breathing in the scent of him.
“Hungry?” Yuuta asks, gently, one broad hand smoothing down Toge’s back. Toge shakes his head against Yuuta’s chest. He really doesn’t want to move. He wants to stay like this with Yuuta, just the two of them, feeling his Esper’s steady warmth, the shelter of his body.
Eventually though, Yuuta’s desire to care for him wins out and the Esper shuffles them to the bedroom where they slowly unwind, Toge undressing bit by bit in the midst of washing his face and brushing his teeth. Yuuta changes into a soft, worn pair of pajama pants, forgoing a shirt, allowing Toge to see the bruising on his back and bicep from the tranq shots. Toge skims his fingers over them delicately, regretful of their existence. He’d always thought he would be there if Yuuta ever lost complete control, that the Esper never need worry about going feral again now that they were partners.
He’d never thought he’d be the cause of bruises like these.
Yuuta catches one of Toge’s wandering hands and lifts it gently, kissing his fingertips. “You’re worrying too loud,” his Esper says, knowingly. He puts Toge’s hand against his cheek, holding it there as he leans into it, dark eyes soft. “Everything’s okay now.”
Toge signs one-handed. But it wasn’t. Before.
Yuuta’s eyes close for a moment and then he presses another kiss to the middle of Toge’s palm before releasing him.
“I really can’t lose you, Toge,” Yuuta says, simply, achingly direct. “I won’t survive you. I can’t.” He says it almost like an apology, as if speaking of his own hypothetical death in response to Toge’s in this way is mildly impolite. “I did it once, after Rika, because you surprised me. I think sometimes… she might have brought you to me, that day.” Yuuta’s blue eyes search his face imploringly. “But I can’t do a third. Please don’t ask that of me.”
Toge’s chest hurts. I won’t, he signs, suddenly a little teary, but don’t leave me behind either, okay?
Yuuta’s expression eases. “Together, then,” he says.
Toge nods.
Together.
He means it, too. He’ll do everything he can to make sure Yuuta never has to suffer the loss of his Guide again. He’ll work on getting stronger, on taking less wild risks, if it means protecting Yuuta’s heart.
They fall into bed together, Toge in one of Yuuta’s discarded shirts, both of them terribly exhausted and needing physical closeness. Toge spends a few minutes smoothing out Yuuta’s aura with Touch and Sound, humming quietly while pressing as close as he can, the line of his body fitting from head to toe against Yuuta’s.
Yuuta tucks his face into Toge’s neck, strong arms and long legs wrapping around him with a gusty sigh of abject relief. Toge rubs circles into his back, thinking of nothing, just drifting in a tiredness that will not yet let him sleep.
“Will you tell me about the cottage?” Yuuta asks after awhile, voice muffled and dreamy, on the edge of deep sleep. Toge smiles into his hair.
He’s not surprised Yuuta noticed something about that small, protected place in his mind. He feels a little silly explaining it aloud though.
“It’s just a wish,” he admits in a scratchy whisper. “A place for us.”
Yuuta pulls back a little to meet his eyes. “For us?” He looks pleasantly surprised, as if he hadn’t expected that. “It’s not from memory?”
Toge shakes his head, a faint blush on his cheeks. I imagine us there sometimes, away from everything. He traces a finger over Yuuta’s brow wistfully. Safe. At ease. No more monsters. No more orders. Just the two of us.
Yuuta’s smile is slow and sweet, eyelids drooping, finally at rest.
“I like the sound of that.”