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The first time Neku notices it, he’s eleven years old.
His hands are full of art supplies, there’s a streak of paint on his cheek, and the art teacher is desperately trying to get the noisy classroom to settle down. The noise is getting to be too much for Neku, starting to make his head throb and his heart hammer in his chest. And it’s as he’s placing his art supplies down on his desk that he notices something out of place on his right wrist.
The classroom is loud, too loud, and Neku grasps onto the sudden distraction like a lifeline, sitting down and watching in shock as messy hiragana forms on the inside of his right wrist. He sounds out the words silently, moving his mouth while not making a sound, until it stops and Neku is left with what looks like a shopping list on his skin.
It’s odd enough that it makes the young boy tilt his head in confusion, blue eyes tracing over the words over and over again to make sure he hasn’t hallucinated them. Then, he gingerly lets a finger rub at them. Nothing happens, as he’d expected, but it looks like the words are part of his skin. No residue comes off, no smears appear, and Neku finds himself perplexed.
He considers asking his teacher about it, but she’s still shouting over the roaring classroom in an attempt to rein in the chaos of the place. And Neku’s never been particularly inclined to talk to people outside of his family, anyways. So instead, he reads the list to himself.
Letice, Appels, Chips.
It’s very poorly written, and seems like something a six year old would come up with. But there’s something funny about it, especially considering the small, scribbled doodles of the foods beneath the list.
If he were left-handed, he’d draw something on his wrist next to the list. But he isn’t. So instead, he picks up a red marker from the box he’d placed on his desk and begins doodling on his other forearm. Flowers, clouds, cats, anything that comes to his mind…it all flows from his head to his marker and out onto the skin.
He’s almost completely filled his pale forearm with washable ink before his teacher notices and scolds him for drawing on his arm instead of on paper.
“I’m just drawing on my arm because someone wrote on my other one.” Neku explains as she hands him a wet cloth to start wiping away the ink on his skin. Only then does she pause with a surprised look in her eyes.
“Who did?” She asks.
Neku shrugs. “I dunno. It just showed up.”
She gets an odd look on her face, one that Neku hasn’t seen before. And it perplexes him. But instead of continuing to scold him, she instead sighs and murmurs, “Just make sure you don’t draw anything mean or inappropriate.”
Neku stares after her as she leaves, still confused by the whole ordeal. And he’s about to wipe the ink from his skin when a boy he’s only spoken to a few times slides his chair closer to Neku and leans over his arm. The nosy boy irks Neku a little, seeing as he shoved himself into Neku’s personal space without warning, but Neku remains polite as he asks, “What are you doing?”
The boy blinks wide green eyes when he sees the patterns drawn on Neku’s arm. “Wow! You’re real good at drawing!”
“Thank you…?” Neku manages, drawing his arm closer to himself.
The brunet boy–Neku now remembers his name is Kei–flashes Neku a grin and says, “Your soulmate is a lucky person if you’re that good at drawing!”
Neku blinks owlishly. He’s heard the term ‘soulmate’ whispered between his parents and the high school students before, but hasn’t heard it from someone his age before. And he sort of understands what the word means, but not entirely. So he asks.
“What’s that?”
Kei snorts, grabbing one of Neku’s blue markers. “Only the most important person you’re ever gonna meet! They share your soul, y’know!”
“And what’s that gotta do with anything?”
“When you draw or write or paint on your skin, it shows up on theirs! So your soulmate sees your cool drawings and probably thinks they’re neat!” Kei explains, pointing at the ink on Neku’s arm with the marker he’d taken.
It clicks then. Neku glances at the shopping list on his right arm. Kei notices the way Neku looks at it and breaks out in loud, raucous laughter. “A shopping list?”
Anxious, Neku turns to make sure nobody is staring at them. Thankfully, no heads were turned by Kei’s loud exclamation and Neku shoots him a glare. “Y-yeah, what about it?”
“Maybe your soulmate doesn’t know about this stuff yet. That’s okay. But if you come over to my house after school, I can tell you all about the soulmate stuff! My mom and dad talk about it all the time.”
For a moment, Neku considers declining and just going home by himself as he usually does. But the thought of learning more about this little mystery is enough to pique his interest, and he shyly nods. Kei breaks out in another blinding, gap-toothed grin. “Sweet! Meet me at the playground after school!”
“O-okay.”
Beat is thirteen when he finally learns what the art on his arms is.
For as long as he could remember, he’s always had ever-changing art on his arms. Some days it’s cherry blossoms, sometimes it’s graffiti, and sometimes it’s something else entirely. He’s always taken it for granted and assumed it was something normal.
He’s in the middle of scribbling another shopping list onto his forearm, in the blank patch always left for his lists, when a high-pitched voice calls, “Arentcha tired of bugging your soulmate?”
Beat pauses with the permanent marker still held in his bandaged hand–the result of a failed attempt at an Impossible at the local skatepark–and glances at his sister in confusion. “Whatchu mean?”
The tiny blonde girl walks up, still in her pajamas despite it being nearly noon, and grabs at Beat’s flower-patterned arm with chubby fingers. “You gotta soulmate! It’s like a best friend, and they can see whatcha draw and write on yourself!”
It takes a moment for Beat to process that new information, chewing on the inside of his cheek for a time with his brow furrowed. Rhyme waits patiently for him to think, as she always does. And when he finally processes what she’s telling him, his eyes fly wide open, his mouth forms into an ‘O’, and he drops the marker on the floor. Dad will probably yell about the permanent marker spots on the floor later, but right now, Beat is focused completely on the flowers all over his arms. “So whatchu tellin’ me now…is dat someone else is drawin’ all this stuff on themself…and I’m seein’ it on me?”
Rhyme nods furiously, giggling the whole while. “Yup!”
Beat realizes then that there’s always been a blank patch of skin in the exact spot where he always has his shopping lists and notes to himself. The care put into that gesture alone is enough to make Beat tear up, but he fights back the urge. Crying isn’t very ‘tough guy’, so he doesn’t do it. Or he tries not to.
Instead, he puffs out his chest in pride and boasts, “ My soulmate don’t care if I write on myself! They prolly think dat’s cool!”
“It’s cool to write ‘lettuce’ on yourself?”
“Yeah!”
Rhyme giggles at his confidence, and Beat merely grins brightly in return. But this gets Beat thinking, and his brow furrows in thought once more. Once he’s set his mind to it, he reaches down to pick up his marker off the floor, holds it gingerly in his bandaged hand, and writes out a shaky, “HI” on the back of his hand, where his partner’s drawings don’t cover.
It takes a moment to receive a reply, but before long, a blue pen scribbles out a messy reply on his opposite hand. “Hello :)”
Beat almost squeals with excitement, his legs bouncing furiously up and down from where he sits at the kitchen table. By now, Rhyme has wandered over to Beat’s right side to watch the exchange between her brother and his soulmate, and she bounces up and down in excitement. “They’re talking!”
“Y-yeah!”
Beat scribbles out another message, practically bouncing up and down with excitement, “im Beat!”
Almost instantly, the blue pen reappears, scratching out quick, excited characters.
“I’m Neku!”
Neku is fourteen when Kei asks, “When are you gonna meet up with your soulmate?”
He’s hanging upside down from a cherry tree by his legs, his hair framing his face like a messy brown halo, and watching Neku with bright green eyes. Neku, sitting at the base of the tree, leans back against it as he finishes the final strokes on a Koi painting he’s doing on his left arm. “Someday, I will. But I don’t know if…”
“If they’ll like you?” Kei finishes. Neku nods silently.
Kei hums thoughtfully, pressing a hand to his chin while still hanging upside down. His brow scrunches in concentration as it always does when he’s thinking deeply about something, and Neku shoots his friend a small, sly smirk. “Is hanging upside-down a good way to get a thought in your head? Because I’m not sure you get those any other way.”
A hand swats at Neku with a scandalized squawk, and Neku laughs softly as he dodges Kei’s playful swipes. At one point, Kei almost falls on his head and has to catch himself on his hands and lower himself safely to the grass. When he’s sitting upright again, he shuffles closer to Neku and watches as he paints on his arm. “I’m pretty sure they’ll like you.”
“What makes you so sure?” Neku asks without taking his eyes off his brush.
“You’re a good listener. And you give good advice.” Kei lists off, counting the points on his fingers. “You’re a sick artist, and you have awesome music taste. And you’re a good friend.”
The compliments make Neku set his mouth in a line, his face heating up in embarrassment. Unfortunately, Kei notices and catches Neku in a rough headlock before viciously messing up his hair. Neku drops his paintbrush with a yelp and claws at Kei’s arm with paint-covered fingers. “And you get embarrassed at stuff like compliments!”
“Shut up!” Neku laughs, finally wriggling free of his friend’s grasp. And in one swift motion, he dips his finger in some blue paint on his small palette and swipes it across Kei’s nose.
Kei screeches , immediately reaching up to wipe a dollop of paint from his face and lunging at Neku. Neku fights him back, laughing all the while, and Kei does the same. Right then and there, Neku decides that he wants to meet his soulmate as soon as possible. Then the three of them–and maybe even Kei’s soulmate–can come to this park and do this.
He’d be able to die content if this were his last day on earth.
Beat worries whenever there’s a news story about a student dying.
Whether it’s an accidental or purposeful death, he can never shake the lingering worry that hangs over his head when he hears his parents discussing the latest news story about any dead student. But nothing shakes him as much as when a student from the high school a few blocks away passes unexpectedly.
The kid’s name was left unsaid, but they say it was a freak accident while he was working part-time at a construction site. He died swiftly and painlessly, so that was one silver lining to it all, but what concerns Beat more than anything is that, for a long time after the student died, no art showed up on his arms.
No flowers, no responses to his little questions written there, only absolute, deafening radio silence. And all he can think about is Neku.
He’s never seen his soulmate in his life, and they’ve never described themselves to each other, but the vague image in his head flits just out of reach. And all he can see in his mind’s eye is that silhouette, crushed under several tonnes of concrete and rebar. It makes him nauseous, anxious, and desperate, and he even goes to the extent of searching the online obituaries with Rhyme’s help. All he needs is a sign, a single pen stroke… to reassure him that Neku is alive.
But no ‘Neku’ shows up in the obituaries.
Beat finds himself blowing up at his parents more than usual in the following week. Snapping at Rhyme, leaving at all hours of the day and night to skateboard by himself. And unfortunately, it isn’t enough to dull the pain of not knowing whether or not his soulmate is still alive.
Nine days after the unnamed student died, Beat’s all but given up.
He’s holed up in his room, wrapped in blankets and staring numbly at his phone in the dark, when something catches his eye. A slow, deliberate mark begins to form on his left wrist. Beat blinks, then his eyes widen. He gasps audibly.
I’m sorry
The hiragana appears slowly on his skin, more slowly than normal, and Beat tears up at the sight of it. But he reaches out for the black marker on his bedside table and pulls the cap off with his teeth.
I mised u
Beat writes.
It takes some time for the response to come, but eventually, Neku writes out a simple response of, “my friend died”
Beat’s mind rushes back to the unnamed kid who’d died over a week earlier. The one he’d thought was Neku. And he feels slightly guilty over the relief that floods into him at the knowledge that it isn’t Neku who died. But he still aches for his soulmate, knowing that the reason Neku wasn’t responding is because he was grieving. So after a few moments of deliberation, Beat writes out, “im sorry”
The response is instant.
What do I do now? I’ve never hurt like this.
Beat…doesn’t have an answer for that. He’s never dealt with loss before, not to this extent. And he has no frame of reference for how to help anyone else deal with their grief process.
But…
He starts writing.
Do u wana meet up? We can talk bout it
Instead of a response with words, a phone number appears on Beat’s arm. His heart jumps at the sight of it. But he hesitates before typing it into his phone.
This is…a huge step. Going from communicating through the soulmate connection, to texting like old friends; it’s a really big leap, especially for Beat. But Neku needs him. So he throws aside his inhibitions, types Neku’s phone number into the recipient bar and sends out a simple message.
Me: Neku?
The response is near-immediate.
Unknown: Beat?
Beat nearly cries in relief. Fighting back the urge to do so, he starts typing.
Me: i never thot id get ta message u
Unknown: me neither
Unknown: but i guess it should’ve been obvious to just text
Me: ya
Me: r u ok
There’s a period of time where Neku doesn’t reply, and it puts Beat on edge. But Beat is patient enough for this sort of thing–he isn’t usually the most patient type–and lets Neku type.
Neku: no
Me: wut was ur freind’s name?
Neku: kei
Me: wut was he like?
After sending the message, Beat wonders if he’s gone too far with his line of questioning. Thankfully, however, Neku seems happy to talk about his friend. He begins rattling off happy memories, recounting little mannerisms, every single prank and fun thing they did together. It’s really heartwarming, and Beat can almost feel Neku’s love for his friend through their link. Like a golden ember planted in his chest, it spreads and fills him with sun-bright warmth until it practically bleeds from him into the air.
By the time Neku presumably falls asleep, the sun is beginning to rise. And Beat finds himself watching it move higher in the sky.
They’ll arrange a time to meet soon. But right now, Beat will be there for Neku until he’s comfortable enough to meet up. Even though it’s through the link and text, it’s still closer than he’s felt to his soulmate since they discovered the link.
Neku wakes up in the Scramble Crossing with no memory and the echo of a loud, unfamiliar noise in his head.
He’s forced to team up with some girl he doesn’t know in order to survive. He fights. Survives. Fights. Survives. Runs. Fights.
Missions come. Missions are passed. It’s kind of a blur, something he doesn’t find himself present enough to care about. He wants to come back to life, he knows that much. But why?
He doesn’t know. He doesn’t even know his last name or how old he is. He doesn’t know what Shibuya is, where anything is, or any of the stuff that was apparently explained to him before he had his memory and emotions taken. But even when he learns that winning will bring him his memory back, he just feels…listless.
There’s nothing in him but hollow emptiness. No sparks of emotion, nothing. It’s all…gone.
That is, until Shiki mentions something offhandedly about soulmates.
Something in him stirs, a distant creature buried under mountains of snow and ice, raising its head to look around in confusion. And Neku mirrors the gesture, looking at Shiki with vague curiosity. He doesn’t say anything, he rarely does since he never feels compelled to. But she catches his eye and gives him a small, gentle smile as she always does. “Right, I should probably explain that to you.”
Neku doesn’t reply. A fleeting half-emotion passes through him like a weak breeze. But he listens.
“A soulmate is a person who shares half of your soul. They love you more than anything, and every time you write or draw or paint on yourself, the art will show up on them as well. It’s a really beautiful thing.” Shiki explains gently, placing a hand over Neku’s as they sit side-by-side on a bench near Hachiko.
The contact is…welcome, Neku thinks? So he doesn’t pull away. But he does stare blankly at Shiki. She laughs lightly, reaching out to ruffle Neku’s hair fondly. Only then does he lower his attention to his brightly colored sneakers and think.
He’s an empty husk like this, he knows that much. But something about Shiki’s words stirs a feeling in him that he can’t quite grasp. It leaves him quickly, but he manages to ask, “Do I have one?”
“Everyone does,” Shiki hums, glancing out at the bustling crowds of Shibuya, “that’s why we gotta get out of this Game. So we can see them again, come back to life, and get our happy ending.”
“Happy…ending?” Neku mumbles numbly.
He’s slowly putting the pieces together, when a voice catches Shiki’s attention. “Ayo, you guys are Reapers, aintchu?!”
Neku’s still staring at the ground, but a pair of black and red skater shoes appear in his vision. Shiki starts defusing the situation, putting herself between Neku and the loud stranger, but Neku is focused on something entirely different: the way his chest twists and pulls at him. Like a toddler dragging their parents towards the shiniest new toy in the store, Neku finds his heart dragging his head up to look at the stranger.
When their eyes meet, Neku finally feels… something.
His chest flutters, and a deep, horrible longing permeates his entire being like oil slogging through his veins. His breathing grows shaky, and he’s not sure why. Does he know this person? He thinks he’d remember someone wearing a stupid skull beanie like that…but again, he’s lost both his emotions and his memories. So maybe he does know this guy.
“...but yeah, w-we aren’t Reapers! We’re Players!” Shiki’s voice fades back into Neku’s focus as he continues staring blankly at the unfamiliar blond boy.
The boy manages to tear his own confused glance away from Neku and focus back on Shiki with an awkward laugh. A hand raises up to fiddle with the back of his black beanie as he introduces himself and his Partner, “Name’s Beat, yo! Dis is my Partner, Rhyme!”
The much smaller, but very similarly-looking, girl beside Beat gives a friendly wave. “Pleased to meet you.”
Shiki hugs her pig plush to her chest with a smile. “I’m Shiki! And this is my Partner, Neku.”
“W-wait, wait, wait–” Beat stammers, holding up a hand, “--didja say his name is…”
Shiki tilts her head in confusion. “Neku? Yeah, I did.”
Beat returns to Neku’s vision, his eyes glimmering with barely-contained emotion. “This is…you’re…”
Neku feels that strange pull in his chest again, but he doesn’t say anything. What would be the point?
Hands find their way to his shoulders, and Beat’s face is suddenly in Neku’s own. “What’s wrong witchu? Huh?”
“Beat–” Rhyme starts.
“Did you guys know each other?” Shiki asks. “He wouldn’t be able to tell you. He…can’t remember anything other than his name. He can’t even remember how to feel things.”
“They…” Beat’s voice is tight, choked with emotion, “...they took yo’ memory?”
Neku blinks. Then nods.
Beat’s hands are shaking now, moving down to Neku’s forearms and eventually to his hands. His thumbs move over Neku’s palms gently and he takes a stuttering breath. “I know ‘im. Cuz he’s my soulmate, yo.”
Once again, that something tries its damnedest to stir in Neku’s cottony head. It fights, thrashes, screams, claws its way through the cotton and clouds to try screaming its fury and despair through Neku’s voice, but no noise leaves him. What does leave him, however, are a few tears that well up in his eyes and roll down his pale cheeks.
He doesn’t know why he’s crying. If it can even be called that. But Beat smiles shakily and laughs, “See? You ain’t remember me, but yo’ soul does. Dat’s what matters. And we gon’ get yo’ memory back. Aight?”
For some reason, Neku nods. He still doesn’t know why.
But what he does know is that he wants to remember. He wants to feel things again. Not these simple, abstract, half-thoughts and weak instincts. He wants to be whole again. And maybe trusting these three people will help him do just that.
Rhyme is gone.
Neku is a husk.
What does that make Beat?
This is what thoughts plague him as he sits alone in the far corner of Mr.H’s coffee shop. He hasn’t spoken to the man since coming here, or rather, being dragged here, and he has no intentions of breaking the silence anytime soon. He’d rather just sit here, fade away into nothing but rot and dust, than take another breath in this miserable place.
A cup of coffee and a sandwich are placed on the table in front of Beat. He turns away.
“You’ve gotta eat, kiddo.” Hanekoma sighs, sitting down across from Beat with his own cup of coffee.
Beat doesn’t bother answering that. What’s the point, anyways? His sister is gone, his soulmate is walking to his death, and he’s just…alone. But Hanekoma continues speaking anyway.
Bringing his cup delicately to his lips, he says, “If you aren’t taking care of yourself, then what's going to be left of you for Neku when he wins?”
Beat draws further into himself, setting his lips in a line.
“You aren’t tellin’ me you think Phones is gonna lose, are you?” Hanekoma asks. “I thought you understood the whole ‘trust your Partner’ spiel I give every Player who’ll listen.”
“He ain’t my Partner.” Beat mutters.
“What makes you think a soulmate is any less of a Partner than one forged through a pact?” Hanekoma refutes. “They’re almost the same, in fact. You share a mind with your Partner, and a Soul with your soulmate. So trust him.”
Only then does Beat raise his head. He watches Hanekoma with dull blue eyes for a moment before picking at the sandwich in front of him. “But Rhyme–”
“I’m workin’ on that one. Take things one step at a time, kid. I promise I’m doing my best, but I don’t have ten pairs of arms. So focus on the here and now.”
A few moments of silence pass between them where Beat racks his brain for ideas on what to do next. He’s never been great at solving problems…but he’s good at direct action. So he reaches into his pocket for the marker he always keeps there and pops the cap off with his teeth as he always did in the past.
A tiny smile plays at his lips as he writes a message to Neku.
Neku and Shiki are flagging. And Higashizawa knows it.
There’s only so much that brute force and a shaky sync can do against the hulking mountain of a man in front of them, and not having an emotional wellspring to draw power from is one hell of a handicap. Higashizawa is playing with them at this point, lazily deflecting one of Mr.Mew’s blows before swatting Shiki and her plush away with one beastly hand. The gesture does nothing to Higashizawa, but it sends Shiki skidding across the pavement with a cry of pain.
Neku is no better.
He may be incredibly good with psychs, but he can’t find it in himself to be motivated, no matter how hard he tries. So he finds himself once again slammed against a concrete barrier on the overpass, the taste of blood in his mouth and his body in horrible pain. And as Higashizawa approaches him nonchalantly, presumably to finish him off, Neku slumps and waits for Erasure to take him.
Something catches his eye.
His eyes shift exhaustedly to where black marks start forming on the inside of his right wrist. And as he watches, they form messy words.
see u soon neku
good luck
Once again, the strange pull finds its way to his chest.
He rises to his feet, swaying as he does so. Steadies himself. Meets Higashizawa’s eyes.
“I can’t lose.”
Flames dance at his palms, and he finds something new in his heart. Something unfamiliar yet also welcoming.
He feels… alive.
When Neku and Shiki erase Higashizawa, Beat finds himself warped into an endless white room. The light is blinding, and he can’t make heads or tails of anything around him. It’s simply an endless aether with no defining features.
Neku and Shiki are here too, but the trio’s reunion is short-lived when a man calling himself the Conductor of Shibuya appears and tells them only one of them is permitted to be resurrected. Neku is given back his memory and emotions, Shiki is given back her appearance…and Beat is not given Rhyme. Kitaniji says she’s just pieces of soul by now, scattered around Shibuya like pollen on the wind. But Beat doesn’t want to believe it.
He can’t .
If he does, he’ll fall into a slump again. No, he needs to focus on getting her back. And he will. Even if he dies doing it. So he tells Kitaniji he’ll play the Game again, and that the second chance at life can go to Neku or Shiki.
( He really wants it to go to Neku.)
Neku and Beat agree to give Shiki the chance at a second life. But it proves to mean nothing in the end when Kitaniji reveals that Shiki was going to be resurrected regardless anyways. Something about Beat and Neku not going through enough development.
Shiki wishes them both luck before vanishing.
Neku and Beat have their entry fees taken once more: Shiki for Neku, and the soulmate connection for Beat.
The second the connection is severed, both Neku and Beat collapse to the ground as though they’ve been punched in the gut. It feels like Beat is breathing through a straw, unable to get enough oxygen into his lungs to keep him from losing consciousness. There is moss growing in his lungs, coating everything, choking, suffocating him.
He can’t breathe, his body won’t work–
– he wakes up in Dogenzaka.
Neku’s initial plan had been to find Beat and go through the second Game with him.
But some other guy Neku doesn’t know, a kid named Joshua, appeared out of seemingly thin air and forced the pact upon Neku. Which isn’t something Neku knew was possible. It felt…wrong, and it still feels wrong, knowing Beat is out there alone when they’d been expecting to be partners.
Joshua is… grating, to say it lightly. He never says what he’s thinking, he’s very obviously hiding something, and his mannerisms are so profoundly irritating that Neku considers strangling him and going to find Beat anyways. But Hanekoma’s words about trusting his partner ring in his head and he begrudgingly follows Joshua on his stupid side jobs and investigations.
The severed soulmate connection aches like an open wound, and Neku finds it terrifying that he hasn’t even seen Beat by the time he wakes up on his fourth day.
Joshua comments on it snidely, as though he knows something about it. And that only adds salt to the wound and leaves it raw and angry.
He says soulmates aren’t worth the pain. That they aren’t worth dying for. And Neku punches him for it.
They don’t speak on the fifth day. Neku feels even less inclined to talk to him when Kariya reveals that Joshua is alive and playing the Game simply because he wants to.
(What kind of person would willingly play the Game?)
(The same kind of person who kills someone to become their Partner.)
On the sixth day, Joshua sort-of apologizes over lunch.
“I never had a soulmate,” he explains slowly, as though talking about himself causes him physical discomfort, “so I don’t understand what the big deal about them is. Perhaps it made me insensitive.”
“Doesn’t give you an excuse to be a dick.” Neku grumbles sourly.
Joshua picks at his ramen. “I suppose not.”
They lapse into silence for a few moments. Then, Joshua asks a question Neku isn’t expecting.
“What’s your soulmate like?”
Neku gawks at Joshua for a heartbeat, but quickly regains his composure and glances off to the side, through the window of Ramen Don . “Kind. He’s probably the kindest person I’ve ever met. He’d jump into hell itself if it meant he could save someone’s life.”
Joshua furrows his brow. “That seems like stupidity to me.”
“Then I guess that’s one of the things we’ll never agree on,” Neku says simply, “because I see it as bravery.”
“There’s a very fine line between bravery and stupidity, Neku.”
“Yeah. But if you can walk that line between the two without stepping into ‘stupid’ territory, then I think that’s worth something.”
Sighing, Joshua daintily brings some noodles to his mouth. “Whatever you say, partner.”
Neku isn’t sure he’s taken the words to heart. That is, until they face Sho Minamimoto the following day.
When they defeat him, the Game Master self-destructs in a blast rivaling the sun. And only then does Neku realize Joshua was listening and remembered every word of their conversation from the previous day.
Because he shields Neku from the blast by throwing himself in harm’s way.
Neku finds himself punished by the Conductor for unknowingly playing with a living Player anyways. As though losing two friends and his soulmate wasn’t enough of a punishment.
Beat spends all of the second week partnered with Mr.H again, flying under the radar and only watching Neku and his strange, enigmatic partner from a distance.
It’s funny, watching Neku desperately attempt not to throttle his partner. Beat can only imagine what would happen had the stranger been his partner. He supposes he’ll need to poke fun at Neku about that when this is all over with.
(If they make it out of here alive.)
Beat’s been running around Shibuya searching for Rhyme’s soul pieces and leaving the Game up to Neku and his partner. And while he supposes that’s not the best thing to do, he trusts Neku. He knows in his heart that Neku wouldn’t slack off on finishing the Game’s missions, so he feels confident enough to go off on his own crusade of sorts to bring Rhyme back. Especially since Beat doesn’t currently… count as an actual Player. Hanekoma explained it to him when Beat sought him out, but he’s supposed to lay low to fly under the Reapers’ radar. At least until the week is done.
(He doesn’t see Hanekoma much this week.)
Then he can meet up with Neku, and they can go home.
By day six, he’s found all the pieces of Rhyme’s Soul.
On day 7, he finds himself holding his sister’s Soul in his hands, in the form of a little coral-colored Noise. And the moment he has her in his arms, he holds her close and sobs. He managed to do it. He managed to collect all the remnants of her without being detected, and he brought them back in perfect condition for Mr.H to piece her back together.
His father’s words echo in his head, telling him he’s stupid, useless, that he’ll never amount to anything and everything he tries to do will result in failure. But if he knew… god , if he only knew what Beat had just succeeded in doing…
He pushes those thoughts out of his head and meets Rhyme’s shining black eyes. Smiling, he rests his forehead against hers and murmurs, “I did it, yo. I didn’t fuck it up.”
As he sits there on the floor of Hanekoma’s cafe, his eyes closed and his forehead pressed to Rhyme’s, he becomes increasingly aware of the sound of footsteps drawing near. And as much as he wants to ignore it and soak up the fact that he succeeded , he opens his eyes and turns towards the source of the noise. Mr.H stands there, a grim expression on his face.
“Sorry to break up your reunion, but Phones and Josh just finished up fighting the GM. And it’s…well, they won, but…”
That’s all Beat needs to hear.
As Hanekoma shouts after him, Beat holds Rhyme close to his body and grabs his skateboard before racing out into the street. The man doesn’t follow him, but Beat doesn’t care. What he cares about is the fact that Mr.H never makes such a grim face, and that can only mean bad things for Neku.
He arrives in time to see Reapers and Noise alike circling Neku like hungry hyenas, darting in to strike a blow before dancing back and letting someone else do it. And the sight of Neku being helpless to stop it is enough to make Beat see red.
WIth Rhyme still clutched to his chest, he rockets forward on his board, slamming into several Noise and an unlucky Reaper. They scatter around him in a panic, not knowing what’s attacking them. And the chaos is enough to let Beat pass through them and skid to a stop between them and Neku. Teeth bared in a vicious snarl, Beat shouts, “Y’all are pussies! Pickin’ on a guy dat can’t fight back? Das’ some bitch shit right dere!!”
He turns then, extending a hand to Neku. “Make a pact wit’ me, man!”
Neku’s bright blue eyes are wide with shock and awe, and he’s staring at Beat like he’s an angel. And maybe Neku thinks he is one, with how he appeared out of nowhere to save him. But Beat doesn’t care about that. What he cares about is kicking the absolute shit out of the Reapers and Noise that thought they could hurt his soulmate and get away with it.
Finally, Neku shakes himself and grabs Beat’s hand.
The moment they make the pact, it feels like coming home . A rush of euphoria floods through Beat’s very veins, whirring in his blood like liquid lightning and rushing into his head until he feels giddy. They’re joined once more, both in Soul and the pact, and Beat almost whoops with joy. But there are more pressing things to deal with at the moment. So instead, he flashes Neku a quick grin before channeling his energy through his board and rocketing back into the fray.
And if having Neku at his back throwing fire and psych energy around makes Beat feel stronger, well, the only one who’ll know is Beat himself.
They’re given seven days to find the GM.
She’s a slippery one, supposedly hiding in one place the whole time, and by day four, Neku is tired of it. He’s tired of the riddles, he’s tired of running around Shibuya like a headless chicken, and he’s tired of the Game. But he keeps pushing forward.
He takes inspiration from Beat, who despite having Rhyme taken as his entry fee, continues to put on a brave face and hunt for Konishi. But on this particular day, he seems…out of it. His eyes are dull, depressed, and his bombastic exterior seems to have melted away into something meeker, more fragile.
There, while they’re trapped under the Miyashita Park Underpass, Neku notices the flowers and two drinks left at the side of the road. And from the way Beat’s been acting on this particular day, Neku can guess why he keeps looking at it with a melancholy expression.
He doesn’t pry, that’s not in Neku’s nature. Especially not with something this delicate. But he does move to stand next to Beat, his eyes fixated on the flowers. For a time, nothing is said. But eventually, Neku remembers something.
Reaching into his pocket, he withdraws a pen he’d always kept with him when he was alive and begins writing on his wrist. Beat seems to notice the gesture and leans over to see what Neku’s writing, but Neku turns subtly so Beat can’t see what he’s writing. So he’s forced to look at his own wrist.
Are you ok?
Beat turns and sits down with his back against the guardrail. A car rushes by, very nearly taking his beanie off his head and almost knocking the flowers into the street. But Neku reaches out and swiftly catches them to place them back where they were. He sits down on the opposite side of the tiny memorial from Beat.
There’s the pop of a marker lid being removed before thick black characters appear on Neku’s right wrist.
Dis were me n rhyme died
Neku casts a sympathetic look in Beat’s direction. Beat isn’t looking at him.
Do you want to talk about it?
For a time, there’s no sound but the whooshing of cars passing by through the underpass. And that’s fine. If Beat doesn’t want to talk, then Neku will respect that.
But eventually, Beat speaks in a small, broken voice shaking with emotion. He explains how he believes he was the one responsible for his and Rhyme’s deaths, that he’d rushed out of the house after an argument with his parents and Rhyme followed him. How he’d tried to save Rhyme from an out of control car and gotten them both killed.
By the time he’s finished his story, there are fat tears rolling down his cheeks, staining the sidewalk and the collar of his shirt. His shoulders shudder with the force of his cries, and he tries desperately to fight his tears. The sight is distressing, and Neku moves to sit beside Beat, their sides pressed against one another.
“I-I jus’ keep fuckin’ everything up, yo,” Beat forces out between sobs, “I can’t do nothin’ right, an’ now I’ve got Rhyme taken away.”
Neku pauses to consider his actions before letting his head rest on Beat’s shoulder. His eyes trace the graffiti lining the underpass walls before he begins speaking. “For what it’s worth, you don’t fuck things up as much as you think.”
Beat sniffles, turning his attention to Neku as he rubs at his eyes.
So Neku continues, “You found Rhyme’s soul pieces and brought them back together. You brought her back, and you would’ve faced God and walked backwards into hell if it meant you’d have a tiny chance of doing that. You’re compassionate, loyal, determined, and stubborn as hell. And you’ve saved my ass more than once. I wouldn’t call you a fuck up. Not at all.”
Slowly, tentatively, Neku shifts his hand until it’s touching Beat’s. Then, when Beat seems to not mind the touch, Neku intertwines his fingers with Beat’s. And Beat squeezes his hand.
“Thanks, man,” Beat sniffs, wiping his wet face on his free arm, “you’s a good guy.”
“You’re the reason for that.”
“Eh?”
Neku chuckles softly at Beat’s confusion before glancing down at his right wrist, where Beat’s words still remain. “If you hadn’t been there for me when Kei died…I don’t know who I would’ve become. I might’ve completely shut everyone out and never been willing to make friends again. You…saved me.”
“I saved…” Beat seems shocked at the words, “...h-hey, I din’t do nothin’. I jus’ did what anyone woulda done!”
“Don’t downplay what good you’ve done. You’re wonderful, and I only hope you start seeing that soon.”
Beat stares at Neku, his face turning cherry-red at Neku’s praise, and it’s honestly adorable. Neku laughs, watching as Beat lowers his head and tries to hide his face. “Y-you can’t jus’ go sayin’ shit like dat without warnin’ a guy!”
“Well, you deserve it.” Neku says with a gentle smile before rising to his feet and pulling Beat up with him, “C’mon. Let’s go beat this stupid Game.”
Beat wipes at his eyes one final time. He flashes Neku one of those grins that rivals the sun’s brightness, and Neku can’t help the smile that spreads across his own face.
“Les’ go!”
It’s been a month since Beat and Neku managed to beat the Game, and Beat can’t say he’s ever been happier.
Rhyme is back, Neku is officially his boyfriend– how fucking crazy is that??– and their ragtag little group of four meets almost daily at Hachiko as they’d promised one another. The days are spent laughing and racing around Shibuya with their friends, and the nights are spent lying in the dark, watching ornately painted flowers blossom on Beat’s skin.
Hell, Beat even bought a few drawing books so he can learn to draw things for Neku in return. Or, that’s what he hopes.
Things seem to be settling back into a comfortable sense of normalcy, albeit with much more happiness in Beat’s life than he remembers, and Beat thinks he could die happy. That is, until Coco Atarashi inserts herself into his and Neku’s lives like a bull in a china shop, dragging them into a new Game that feels much more surreal than the one they’d survived.
(Beat wishes he’d attacked her on the spot.)
When Mr.H breaks the spell and reveals that this is all a fabrication by Coco, she drops her facade and becomes a vicious, unpredictable creature. She’s gone from a bubbly mouse to a cornered leopard, and her fangs are not something to be disregarded.
Beat thinks it’s finally over when they defeat the tapir Noise she’d created.
But there’s a gunshot.
And
Beat
watches
Neku
fall.
( Do something.)
Beat lunges forward despite the agony in his chest as the soulmate bond is slowly severed.
Catches Neku before he hits the pavement.
(Don’t go.)
Another gunshot rings out, echoing off the walls of Udagawa. Beat flinches, holding Neku close.
(Blood on his hands.)
Neku stares at Beat with wide, horrified eyes. His pale fingers clutch at the front of Beat’s shirt.
(This isn’t happening.)
“ Don’t let me–”
Neku vanishes, leaving not even a speck of blood behind. It takes Beat a moment to process what had just happened.
he
he’s alone.
neku
is
gone.
And Beat screams his heartbreak at an uncaring sky.
time is indeterminate
there’s nothing
broken skyscrapers claw at the rippling sky like a drowning man’s hands clawing at the water’s surface
and neku is trapped with the one who took him away
she treats it like a game
“It’ll be fun rebuilding Shinjuku, you’ll see!” she chirps
neku doesn’t speak to her
he doesn’t speak at all
he
just
wants
to
disappear
and he’s not sure how long he’s been here
but one day
daffodils bloom on his right arm
and neku forgets how to breathe
he sits up from where he’d been lying on his side in a desolate alley
And watches as sun-yellow daffodils with shaky lineart slowly form in a line from his wrist to his elbow. They spread out from there over time, and Neku isn’t sure how long he’s been watching them appear on his skin before tears begin to fall.
Great, heaving sobs rack his body as he hugs his arm close to him, and he knows it’s an ugly thing to cry like this. But he can’t be bothered to care. Because Beat remembers him. And even if Neku can’t communicate with him, the art Beat creates is enough until he can see him again.
Neku shakily reaches into his pocket for the pen that still remains there.
I love you
And it doesn’t matter that Beat can’t see it.
Because he will.
Neku won’t stop telling him until the day they see one another again.
Beat finds himself in the UG again by complete accident.
He’d picked up a free pin from some sketchy guy on the streets of Shibuya, and being a veteran of the Reapers’ Game, he’d come to develop the habit of picking up every pin he can. And just like that, he’d found himself in the Reapers’ Game again three years after escaping it.
Unfortunately, the Players are hunting him.
He’s pretty good at hiding in plain sight, considering he’d done it while he was hunting for the pieces of Rhyme’s Soul back in the Long Game. But these Players–especially the Ruinbringers–are persistent.
And Beat is tired of running.
He finds himself on the roof of one of Shibuya’s many tall buildings, facing a girl with dull eyes– like Neku’s in week one– and one of Shiki’s pig plushies held in her hand. The sight pisses him off, because that’s his friend’s design, it shouldn’t be in the hands of a fucking Reaper, and he glares daggers at her as he stalks closer.
She’s a formidable foe, he can tell that much. But Beat won’t ever pass up a chance to take down a Reaper.
(And if he dies for real, maybe he’ll see Neku again.)
He glances down at his left arm, pulling up the sleeve to reveal the hundreds of yellow daffodils he’d painstakingly painted on himself over and over and over again during the past three years. And as the Reaper stares at him with blank eyes, he shows her his arm. “See dis, yo?”
She doesn’t respond.
“Dis is why I can’t lose. So I ain’t gonna.”
Energy crackles to life at his feet, dancing around his sneakers like lightning in a jar before cracking the ground at his feet. But as he’s about to throw himself at the Reaper girl, a couple of kids and a college age girl appear behind him. They call him Neku, regard him like he’s a legend, and he supposes that maybe he hasn’t given them reason to believe otherwise.
So he clears the air and joins their team.
He makes it clear that the only reason he’s here willingly is because he’s looking for Neku. And he’ll do anything to find him.
(They stare at the flowers on his arm.)
Beat doesn’t say it outright, but they know. They know why he’s so determined to find Neku.
(They don’t comment on it when he pulls a small container of acrylic paint and a paintbrush from his pocket every day.)
When they find themselves outmatched by Minamimoto in Udagawa, Beat knows what he has to do. And he finds himself almost completely at peace with the situation.
(The only scary thing about it all)
He faces Minamimoto with a savage grin on his face.
(Is the thought of never seeing Neku again)
Even as his battered and wounded body falters under Minamimoto’s blows, he grits his teeth, shouts at Rindo and the kids to run. Tastes blood in his mouth, spits it on the pavement.
There’s a tingling in his left arm.
The sleeve is pulled up to his elbow, revealing the unblemished skin there…but it’s no longer bare. Countless ‘i love you’s’ and one-sided conversations and sketchy flowers appear on his skin out of nowhere, as though by some miracle. And as his eyes widen, Minamimoto raises one massive paw.
The hit doesn’t come.
Warmth floods the chilly alley, bathing Beat in golden light. He falls to his knees.
“Got me good, yo…”
“Are you alright?”
That voice.
Beat stiffens.
Raises his head.
And
his
eyes
meet
Neku’s.
(His pain is forgotten.)
Beat rises to his feet as tears well up in his eyes. Rushes forward, his battered arms aching as he throws them around Neku’s torso, lifting the lankier young man off the ground and holding him close. He laughs wetly, pressing his forehead to Neku’s chest and murmuring, “I looked everywhere for you!”
“And you found me.” Neku says, his hands running through Beat’s hair as his voice tightens with emotion.
And as they hold one another tight, hoping to whatever god is listening that this is real, it isn’t a dream…the tears finally fall.
They managed to find one another.
And that’s all they ever wanted.