Chapter Text
Almost three days had passed since Takumi had learned the truth of what he was.
He’d been lying in bed all that time. Vaguely, he recognized his own hunger, but that didn’t seem to matter. Nothing mattered anymore. He had no past and no future. He barely felt present in his own body.
None of it was real. Not his parents. Not his ordinary life. Not Karua. They were tools. Designed to destroy a population and steal their planet out from under them. Once the mission was done, they would be thrown away like any other tool that had outlived its usefulness. Why then should they even keep fighting at all?
The answer was obvious. They shouldn’t.
Takumi would lie in this same spot until the invaders swarmed the school. He’d lie in this same spot until his pathetic excuse for a life came to an end.
The sound of a door opening barely registered. Takumi kept facing the wall, eyes unfocused. It was only when fingers brushed the back of his neck that he realized that someone was in his room.
He didn’t have the energy to jump. Instead he turned slowly towards the figure like he was still in a dream.
Oh. Maybe Eito was going to be the one to kill him.
Takumi closed his eyes again. This was better. He didn’t have to wait for the next attack. He was almost grateful.
There was no pain though. The fingers that had brushed his neck then retreated when he turned came back. Then Eito’s entire hand was there, just resting in the same spot. Wait. Why was Eito touching him? Takumi couldn’t even feel the fabric of his gloves.
He opened his eyes again. Eito was covering his mouth with his other hand, a disgusted grimace on his face. His eyes were squeezed shut.
“What…are you doing…?” Takumi asked.
Eito opened one eye to scowl at him, then closed it again. He didn’t give an answer.
Vaguely, Takumi recognized that he should probably call out. Eito had escaped from his cage somehow. He was doing…something. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. Takumi should…stop him, right?
What would be the point though? Takumi couldn’t find the willpower to do anything at all. If whatever Eito was planning put an end to this hollow feeling in his chest, Takumi was okay with it. No matter what it was.
Takumi felt Eito’s body tense up just before his hand retreated. When Takumi turned his attention back to Eito, he found him staring at his face with a freaky amount of intensity.
“Eito…?” Takumi shrunk back a little.
Eito pulled back too, expression souring. Then he turned away. Takumi watched as Eito paced around his room. He was thinking about something deeply, arms crossed with a hand up covering his mouth. The gloved hand. The bare one he held out away from the rest of his body.
A noise from outside drew Eito’s attention, and he quickly moved to the door, closing it almost all the way and peeking outside. Takumi could only see half of his face from here, but the scowl was unmistakable. One of the others? Who other than Eito would have the energy to move around right now?
Takumi’s chest suddenly felt tight. There was only one answer. The only person here who was real. Her.
He sat up a bit in bed. The rustling drew Eito’s attention back to him. Takumi watched as his eyes widened. Then Eito lurched towards him.
Takumi barely had time to open his mouth before his pillow was ripped out from under his head then pushed forcefully over his face.
Suddenly, he couldn’t breathe. Instinct kicked in, and without thinking he threw up his arms to try and push Eito away from him. Eito moved around to avoid his swinging arms, and even when Takumi did catch hold of fabric, he was too weak to push Eito away.
His arms gave out. His eyes rolled back. Consciousness abandoned him.
Despite his earlier thoughts, there was still a pang of fear as his light gave out. Part of it was for Nozomi, but somehow part of it was still for himself. What happened to a tool when it died? Living was painful, but there was no guarantee that what came after would be any better. He was too out of it to question why Eito was bothering to kill him before absorbing him until the last of him clicked off.
Takumi woke again moments later.
The pillow was gone. Something had been shoved into Takumi’s mouth. His wrists were tied together behind his back, and Eito was in the middle of binding his ankles as well. His other glove was back on.
Takumi tried to shout, but the cloth in his mouth muffled the noise to almost nothing. Eito noticed though, turning up as he quickly finished tying off the bindings on his legs. Takumi still tried to kick him, but Eito easily moved out of the way.
Suddenly more present than he’d been in days, Takumi rolled towards the side of his bed. The sound of the thump of him hitting the floor was his only idea of how to draw Nozomi back to the room or to rouse one of the others.
Eito caught him by the shoulder before he hit the edge. For the first time, that familiar fury flashed across his face. Eito leaned closer, speaking low. “If anyone finds you like this, I will kill them. Think about that before you do anything stupid.” He pushed Takumi back towards the middle of the bed then went back to the door.
Takumi couldn’t make himself move again. Fear had set in. He didn’t understand what Eito was doing at all. He didn’t understand how he was even here. Not knowing anything made the fear worse, but one thing was clear: he couldn’t let Eito hurt anyone else. His life meant nothing, but theirs were still precious to him. Whatever Eito had planned, if it only involved Takumi, that was fine.
Eito returned after only a few seconds. They locked eyes for a moment, and a small smile curled onto Eito’s face. “Good. I’m glad you understand.” Takumi swallowed.
With a surprising amount of strength, Eito picked Takumi up and slung him over his shoulder. Takumi let out a small grunt. He felt Eito’s shoulder digging into his stomach. Eito shivered and made a noise of his own, then pulled up his hood to put a barrier in between Takumi’s body and his neck. Then he took a deep breath and stepped outside.
Takumi winced as the sun hit him for the first time in days. He barely got a glimpse of the cluster of shuttered rooms before he was inside and his fellow tools were beyond him.
As Eito descended the stairs and rounded corners, he would glance around for any signs of movement before continuing on. When they got down to the first floor Eito stopped for the longest, eyeing the right hall. Takumi couldn’t hear anything, but Eito clearly could. Eventually though, he kept moving, heading left and went into the garage.
It was only when Eito laid him down on the first row of passenger-side seats in the bus that the situation fully sunk in.
“Don’t move,” he ordered before stepping off the bus once more. Takumi sat up enough to watch Eito leave the room and turn left heading back the way they came.
As soon as Eito was out of sight, Takumi began tugging on his bindings. His best chance was to ambush him when he got back. To do that, he’d need to grab a weapon from outside the bus, so he’d need to get his bindings off quickly if he wanted any hope of succeeding.
He thought that, but no matter how hard he tugged or twisted on the restraints, they refused to loosen. He tried to work the bit of cloth out of his mouth so he could use his teeth, but that wouldn’t come out either. A muffled noise of frustration was the only thing he managed to accomplish.
Eito returned a few times in a rhythmic pattern, loading something new into the back of the bus every time he came back. It took a bit for Takumi to reorient himself enough to see what he was packing. The first few trips had been for cartons of bottled water, and the latest held a large stack of canned food. Takumi wasn’t the best at math, but it seemed to him that there was enough water there to last two people 30 days.
What the hell did Eito want with him?
Nothing made sense. Eito hated people. If he was going to flee the school again, he could’ve done that easily with all of the SDU out of commission the way they were. Why would he want to take a disgusting monster with him? Why had he touched Takumi?
There was a larger gap between the next run of supplies, and Eito looked a bit on edge when he did return. More food. He only took a moment to catch his breath before going out again. The final trip was about as long as the last, but this time Eito didn’t return with anything other than a few extra sets of clothes, at least that Takumi could see.
Eito closed the back of the bus carefully and raised the garage door by hand. Both times he took things slow, careful not to make any unnecessary noise. When he got into the driver seat, he lifted his glasses and rested them on his forehead then just sat there for a bit, hovering his hand over the ignition. He took a breath, turned on the bus, and immediately pressed down hard on the gas.
The bus lurched forward then immediately came to an abrupt halt that sent Takumi tumbling from his seat and onto the floor.
Eito made a sharp noise. The bus went into reverse and jerked uncertainly backward. Takumi tried to right himself and found the bus had been very close to the wall before it was reversed. Eito pressed down hard on the gas again, and Takumi tumbled backward down the aisle, grumbling as loudly as he could about it.
“Just deal with it for a second, I’m trying not to explode.” Eito sounded like he was speaking though gritted teeth.
Explode? What the heck was that supposed to mean? Takumi wished he could get this stupid thing out of his mouth, so he could actually start asking some of his hundreds of questions.
There was a hiss as the fire extinguishers went off, and they passed through the wall of fire. After that, the ground became extremely bumpy, and Eito would turn jerkily around obstacles which only made things worse. Takumi had to hold up his head to stop it from repeatedly banging against the metal floor.
Around five minutes passed like that before Eito slowed the bus to a halt. He watched in the rear-view mirror for a few seconds then sighed. He rose slowly, put his glasses back in place, and then made his way back to the back of the bus to stand over Takumi.
“Can you get yourself back into a seat on your own, or do I have to touch you again?”
Takumi glared at him.
He smiled. “I see you’ve got some life in you again, Takumi. That’s good.”
Takumi flicked his eyes down to the gag in his mouth meaningfully then went back to glaring at Eito.
Eito crossed his arms. “I have no desire to listen to your grating voice shouting at me.” He tilted his head. “Can you control yourself?”
Takumi imagined strangling him.
Eito smiled again. “I’ll take that as a no. So, we’re back to my first question. I assume you’d rather be in a seat for the rest of our trip? I’ll put you back there if I have to, but I’d rather not. Carrying you earlier was unpleasant enough.”
Then why are you doing any of this?
Takumi tried to send the question telepathically, but even though it looked like Eito could read him like a book, he didn’t bother giving an answer. He just waited. In protest, Takumi simply refused to move.
Eito raised an eyebrow. “I could just leave you on the floor.”
Takumi flopped down onto it and closed his eyes.
“You’re only hurting yourself by being stubborn, you know?”
Takumi continued ignoring him. Eito sighed. An arm slipped under his knees and his back. Takumi’s eyes opened wide as Eito lifted him into the air and carried him back towards the front of the bus.
It felt extremely different to be carried this way compared to how Eito had been carrying him earlier. Every muscle in Takumi’s body tensed immediately. He couldn’t stop staring at Eito’s face even as it was grimaced in pure disgust. He looked like he was holding his breath too.
Eito set him gently down in the same seat he started in, then quickly moved away, covering his mouth. Takumi watched him go to the back of the bus, change out his jacket and gloves for a fresh pair, and take a deep sniff of some spice in one of the food boxes he’d brought.
If it was going to be that bad, why not just leave me on the floor?
Eito didn’t look at him as he walked back to the front of the bus and sat back down in the driver seat. He drove slower now, which made it easier to stay seated. Takumi stared out the window, trying to track where they were at. He thought he recognized a few things, but Eito just kept going. Soon they were far beyond anywhere Takumi had explored before. Still, he tried to watch the sun at least so he had some idea of what direction to go in order to get back.
It occurred to Takumi that this was something Eito could have avoided happening if he’d left him on the floor.
Hours passed before Eito decided to pull the bus over. When he did, he pulled away from the main rode and positioned it between two buildings that were still mostly intact. It’d be difficult to spot it if the person searching didn’t know to look in this specific area.
“Stay here, Takumi,” said Eito as he rose, pocketing the bus keys. “I’ll be back soon.” He reached into his jacket pocket and frowned, then went to the back of the bus for a second and returned with an infuser. He activated his cryptoglobin then stepped out of the bus. Takumi watched as Eito went into one of the two buildings next to the bus and disappeared from sight.
Once more, Takumi tried to wiggle out of his bindings. There wasn’t much he could do if he did get free at this point. He’d need the keys from Eito or an infuser of his own to have any hope of making it back to the school. There was no hope of taking either from Eito with him transformed and Takumi not. Still, he was so stiff that he’d take them off just for a chance to stretch out a bit, not to mention how dry his throat was.
He still couldn’t get out though. He was exhausted. It felt like he might be able to get out if he could apply a bit more force, but the combination of his own lack of energy and the pointlessness of the activity made that virtually impossible. Eventually, he gave up. He told himself he would wait for a better opportunity, but he knew it was an excuse.
Leaning against the window, Takumi closed his eyes. He wondered if Nozomi had heard the bus drive off. Did she find Eito’s cage empty, go to warn Takumi and find his room abandoned too? What was she thinking now? Did she think he was dead? Did everyone? Or were they still too lost in their own despair to think of anyone else right now?
Suddenly Takumi felt so stupid for locking himself away from everyone else. They should have stuck together. No matter how false his life had been, these people, his friends, were still important to him. Now…now he’d probably never see any of them ever again.
How big of an idiot was he? So convinced he had no connections in the world that he let the ones he did still have slip through his fingers without so much as a fight. If he’d just shouted the second he’d spotted Eito, or when Nozomi passed by his room, or if he’d just been smart enough to lock his damn door, things wouldn’t have gone so wrong.
When Eito finally came back, he found Takumi crying quietly.
Eito stopped short and just stood there a while, watching him. Takumi knew he was standing there, of course, but he couldn’t bring himself to open his eyes let alone stop sniffling.
After a long moment, Eito quietly walked to the back of the bus. It was only then that Takumi opened his eyes. He tried in vain to wipe away what he could on his shirt, but he couldn’t get a good angle with his arms pinned behind him. He let out a long breath and gave a hard sniff to try and calm himself as best he could.
When Eito returned, he was carrying two bottles of water, cans of food, and forks. He set them on the seat across from Takumi. Afterwards he moved closer, reached out, and plucked the cloth out of Takumi’s mouth then coaxed Takumi into turning slightly before undoing the bindings on his wrists. Takumi watched Eito as he worked, but Eito was just frowning forward, not really looking him in the eye.
Takumi wiped the rest of his tears away then massaged his wrists idly while Eito waited. When he was done, Eito passed him half of the food and water. “Eat.” It was certainly an order, but it didn’t have Eito’s usual bite.
Eito moved to the other seat and opened his own bottle. Like Takumi wasn’t there at all, he ate his meal silently, frowning to himself and not looking at anything.
He was still in his class armor. Takumi doubted he could get away with trying to untie his ankles without pushback. It made him feel pathetic, but all he could do was obey.
The water felt amazing in his dry throat. He had to take the food slow since it’d been so long since he’d eaten, but after the initial discomfort it felt better to have it inside of him as well. After a while, he could feel Eito watching him, but he ignored him. It wasn’t until Takumi finished off the last of his can that the two finally met each other’s eyes again.
“You know I’m not planning to kill you, right?” asked Eito, studying Takumi’s expression. “There would be no point in going to the trouble of taking you if I just wanted you dead.”
Takumi frowned. “Yeah, I figured that. What do you want?”
Eito tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “I’m not planning on torturing you either.”
Takumi narrowed his eyes right back. “Okay?”
“Am I really that terrifying to you? You spared my life twice. Was that only to ease your own conscious?”
Takumi blinked. Suddenly he realized the question Eito was dancing around. He sat up straighter. “I’m not worried about my safety, Eito. I’m worried that I’m never going to see any of my friends ever again. That they’re back at the school panicking because you kidnapped me. They have enough to worry about without this, not to mention they’re more vulnerable without me there to fight.” His eyes clouded over. “They could be being attacked right now while I…”
“They’ll be fine,” Eito said flatly. “If anything, your disappearance will give them a reason to finally get out of bed.”
A surge of anger filled him. “This hasn’t affected you at all, has it?” Takumi scoffed. “Of course not. You didn’t have anyone to lose.”
When Takumi fixed Eito with a glare, he found a cold look on his face that he wasn’t expecting. He couldn’t read a single emotion behind those eyes. Takumi was used to Eito hiding behind a pleasant smile. This was complete emptiness.
Takumi swallowed. “Am I wrong?”
There was that pleasant smile. “No. You’re completely correct.”
The discussion ended there. Eito bound his wrists again, this time in front of his chest, before undoing the bindings on his ankles. Once he was done, he attached the ankle bindings to the ones around Takumi’s wrists in a sort of leash. Wordlessly, he led Takumi off the bus and into one of the abandoned buildings.