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“Just so you know, bullets don’t work on me.”
It’s the moment before it starts crumbling down. The moment before it hits.
It is one of the only times she has seen Hiromi react so openly with anger. The smile on her face was no doubt a ploy, a form of intimidation perhaps, one that was now useless. She knows what starts to ooze out isn’t blood.
She isn’t just angry, but also embarrassed. She knows there are better ways to die than this. Ruriko knows Hiromi deserved better than this. The Wasp-Aug collapses unceremoniously, too similar to a bug stepped on. Ruriko hurries to her side, clinging to her last bit of hope. It was not supposed to end this way.
Hiromi looks up at her with the last bit of her strength. “It’s not fair, Ruri-Ruri.” She still chooses to use that old nickname until the very end. “I wanted you to be the one to kill me.” It’s like they are children again, admitting secrets to only each other. Ruriko feels like an old wound has reopened, like her heart is physically being ripped apart.
But what’s done is done. Hiromi lies still. The Wasp Augment is neutralized. Her associates walk off and Ruriko’s heart is left exposed and bleeding. She thought she was stronger than this. She tries to mend herself back together, but standing up, she knows something has shifted within her. It feels like a missing puzzle piece, obscuring the completed image just slightly. She keeps her gaze on the ground.
She can’t look at him. She knows he has just seen her heart ripped apart, but she can’t look at him. If she looked and saw even a hint of his kind, warm heart in his eyes, she might fall apart completely. She can’t allow herself that, even though she knows he would be more than willing to pick up the pieces. So, she attempts to make a compromise with the two parts of herself; the one that wants to stay clean and composed, and the other that desperately wants something, anything that will help the terrible ache in her chest. Takeshi lets her lean her head on his chest and doesn’t force her to do anything else. Her tears feel burning hot running down her face, and leave their streaks after they are long gone. She knows it won’t be the only stain Hiromi will leave on her.
Ruriko finds returning to their mission will be more difficult than expected. What she thought was one puzzle piece out of place was actually multiple pieces out of place, making the entire picture unrecognizable from what it is supposed to be. She can’t keep a calm composure anymore, because everything is wrong, or too much, or not enough. The very least her associates could do is make things easier for her after what happened. Even Takeshi, awkwardly keeping a distance, can never tell what she wants.
What is worst of all, is that it makes her crave the type of intimacy they could never have with Hiromi, more than ever before. Hiromi simply saw relationships as a power dynamic; Someone would always serve the other. That was her happiness, and to try and convince her to leave S.H.O.C.K.E.R was ill-fated.
In her dreams, Hiromi is there. Her hands on her neck, just tight enough to be threatening. She had a mischievous grin, and knew she had Ruriko where she wanted her.
She snickered, “Oh Ruri-Ruri, I could strange the life out of you right this very moment. What ever shall you do?”
Ruriko closed her eyes. “Nothing.”
“My my, you would succumb to your fate so easily?”
“No, because I know you. You would never do such a thing to me, no matter what.”
Hiromi was quiet after that, and Ruriko never saw what expression she had on her face. After a moment, “Are you so sure? Why would you so strongly believe such a thing?”
Ruriko didn’t hesitate with her response, “Because you love me. I can tell, you do it the only way you can.” When Ruriko worked alongside her brother, she thought about what a normal life for her would look like. She wonders if in another life Hiromi would have grown to become kinder, not the opposite. One where they could be honest with each other.
“Ruriko, would you ever cry for me?”
This answer comes just as easily, “Of course, more than you will ever know.” Her throat feels tight, but she can’t feel Hiromi’s hands anymore.
Ruriko rolls over in the futon. She secretly hopes the noise would be enough to stir Takeshi from his sleep so she can talk with him, rather than continuously mull over her own thoughts. She studies his face, thankful he is at peace in his sleep at the very least. She hears his words in her mind clear as day, “I’m here. You are safe and secure.” Sincere to a fault, and compassionate as always. She should remember to thank him for that in her will, she knows how insufferable she was the first few days after the incident. Alongside where she will thank him for delaying the inevitable for her sake, of course.
She knows once her heart is healed, things will return to how they were before between them, and it will be entirely because of her. He will be the compassionate hero with the bleeding heart, and she will be the calculating one focused entirely on efficiency and staying three steps ahead of the enemy. There is only so long until the Butterfly Augment hatches, after all.
Maybe this little bit of forced vulnerability did her good after all. It would have been nice to see where this could have led. Maybe there would have been a time where she could let Takeshi hold her and wipe away her tears.
But it’s too late for her now. She is stuck between becoming too soft, or staying too hard. Like Hiromi, she will likely die staying true to her inclinations, never changing. At least she had the chance to remember what catharsis felt like. So Ruriko rolls back over to her left side and goes back to sleep.