[ It should sting. By all rights, nothing should hurt Maruki worse than this, the admission that someone so vital to him lost every memory of their strange, volatile, precious time together. There's little that can bring him to his knees as quickly as that, and it has happened time and time again in this reality.
It should sting. The pain should show clearly on his expressive face, give Akechi the satisfaction of having landed the intended blow.
Instead–
For the first time today, for the first time since his disappearance fully sunk in–
Maruki feels the corners of his lips lifting, unused muscles sore beneath the weight of his smile. ]
You're right. We were both fools.
[ It would have been worse if one of them remembered the other. The betrayal and guilt would have seared hotter than the sun's blinding rays that first morning after the coldest day of the year.
If they both forgot, then–
The space between them is evened out. They stand on level ground, facing one another as their whole selves, plucked from the end of the roads they were always destined to walk and set forth on a new path–
Together. ]
I suppose we can look at it as a learning experience now that we're both here again.
[ Carve something new with him, hand in hand with the past. ]
Come on. [ Maruki jerks his head back toward the way he came, the long meandering walk through Somnius and the surrounding woods, all the way back to the machiya. ] Walk with me. There's something else I want to ask you.
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It should sting. The pain should show clearly on his expressive face, give Akechi the satisfaction of having landed the intended blow.
Instead–
For the first time today, for the first time since his disappearance fully sunk in–
Maruki feels the corners of his lips lifting, unused muscles sore beneath the weight of his smile. ]
You're right. We were both fools.
[ It would have been worse if one of them remembered the other. The betrayal and guilt would have seared hotter than the sun's blinding rays that first morning after the coldest day of the year.
If they both forgot, then–
The space between them is evened out. They stand on level ground, facing one another as their whole selves, plucked from the end of the roads they were always destined to walk and set forth on a new path–
Together. ]
I suppose we can look at it as a learning experience now that we're both here again.
[ Carve something new with him, hand in hand with the past. ]
Come on. [ Maruki jerks his head back toward the way he came, the long meandering walk through Somnius and the surrounding woods, all the way back to the machiya. ] Walk with me. There's something else I want to ask you.