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“Will you help me with the dishes?”
A boy looked to his mother, closing his book and standing up. He didn’t need to answer, immediately taking a sponge in one hand.
“Thank you sweetie. Did you need any help with your homework later?”
“No, I think I understand it. It’s not that hard actually.”
The mother smiled, quickly kissing the boy’s head.
“Well if you need any help, just ask. If your dad asks for me tell him I’m outside taking the laundry down.”
“Ok mom. Do you want me to start dinner?”
“No, you’re busy, tell your dad to though. If he goes complaining just tell him it’s an order from me.”
“Alright, but I can still do it if you’re both tired.”
“Oh hush, you’re too young to be worrying about your parents! And we aren’t that old yet.”
The mother smiled before going out into the sun, the boy calling after her with the same smile on his lips.
“I’m almost 16, I’m not that young!”
~
He didn’t shoot up from bed, gasping with the after images of blood and fire. His eyes opened slowly, easily, and he rose without panic. He inhaled deeply, even though his lungs gained nothing from extra oxygen. The dream he had had was rare, and extraordinary. A glimpse of his past life without the pain, without the cringing guilt to wake up to. Just sun leaking through the window and soft smiles on faces. No significance other than joy.
It was what Genos called his third awakening.
The first awakening had been after Doctor Kuseno had changed his body. The second had been when he had regained his humanity, and fallen in love with the man that taught him how. And now, the third, was his full understanding that he could no longer continue his work as a hero until he lay his past demons to rest, and found the cyborg that had gone mad so may lifetimes ago.
He was not driven by revenge. He was not fueled by hate. His mind was balanced, not fully at peace, but in a state of understanding and acceptance. The body he inhabited had made small progressions over time, but the excuse that he was not strong enough had left his thoughts. He would never be strong enough for everything, but he could be strong enough for himself and the people he cared about. Because if there was one thing he learned from the man he loved, it was that ultimate power and endless strength did not solve the harder problems life gave you. Those problems had to be faced with an entirely different type of strength, and it was this strength that Genos felt confident in.
He stared out the window into the destroyed world he chose to surround himself with, and then rose from the futon before cleaning, preparing two meals, eating one, and leaving.
~
The fact that he had asked to go down the elevator must have shocked them into agreeing. He didn’t need to state a reason, it wasn’t like everyone didn’t know the reason already. And technically, he had the clearance to go down, just not do anything else besides that. He knew the rules like he knew every crack in the apartment, but this would be the first time he actually abided by them. As the elevator doors closed, he closed his own eyes. He could hear the machinery around him, practically feel the layers of steel and dirt pressing against him. And then the elevator stopped, and the doors opened in sync with his eyes.
“What are you doing?”
He wasn’t even half way down judging by the number displayed in the hallways behind Tatsumaki. It was a surprise she hadn’t stopped him sooner. He met her gaze evenly, clenching his fists to keep himself from lashing out, from glaring, from attacking. He hated her. He hated her. But it wasn’t her fault.
“I’m going to leave for a period of time that is currently unknown. I came to ask you for permission to say goodbye for the time being, as it is very important I see him before I go, and tell him I will be back.”
His words were still clipped, his jaw too tight. He was emanating tension and frustration, but her power surrounded her like one enormous bubble, and he could feel it pushing on every wire in his body. She glared at him with unashamed dislike, and her hands twitched with the same agitation his own hands clenched with. He did not need to hear her say anything to know how much she completely despised him. He knew hate better than anyone, but her hatred towards him rivaled his own towards her.
“Murderers should not be allowed to walk freely.”
“I am no murderer.”
“You embarrass yourself by coming here, and then you lie to my face. The only reason you haven’t died long ago is because Saitama would kill me after I finished you.”
Her words were hissed and spat at him, and her body twitched almost violently. She was aching to destroy him. The only thing holding her back was her sense of self preservation, the knowledge that should she loose control and give in to her desire, she would sign her own death sentence. Genos had no idea what level of friendship she and Saitama had built up over time, but it wouldn’t matter in the slightest if she did something to severely piss him off. Genos almost felt smug at the thought that Saitama had so very clearly and successfully laid down the law that should anyone fuck with Genos, they are by extension fucking with Saitama, and they would pay the price. It was a bit different because Saitama couldn’t actually do anything immediately, seeing as how he wouldn’t know of any event until after they happened, but it was a well kept promise that he would find out, and he would make the person responsible pay dearly. As much as Tatsumaki wanted to kill Genos, she clearly understood that there would be no escape from the most powerful man in the universe and his wrath.
However, it wasn’t like Tatsumaki didn’t have a reason for wanting Genos dead. Genos himself wanted the woman dead for his own reasons, reasons that could be argued were not actually Tatsumaki’s fault and had led to a misplaced hatred. But Tatsumaki blamed Genos for something he could not truly deny.
“I told Bang to leave me. It was by his choice that things ended the way they did. In the end, I had no control over his actions or the outcome.”
He had told himself this almost a hundred times a day, said it out loud in the apartment, written it down in his journals. He knew he didn’t believe it yet, knew he still blamed himself and wanted to admit that, but now was the time to shove the guilt and grief behind and focus on the goal.
“If you had just died he would have saved himself. If you hadn’t been so pathetic he would still be here.”
He had said the same thing to himself so often that words didn’t even faze him. They were his own thoughts, just said out loud by a different voice.
“I cannot change the past. I know it was my own mistakes that led to what happened, but even so, Bang still made his own decisions.”
“I might one day forgive Bang for throwing his life away for a machine, but I will never forgive you. You’re no hero, you’re just a robot with weapons and a human mask.”
He would not betray himself to her. He would not let her know his weakness to such words, and how he so often thought the same. He would not argue either, because she would beat him down with a harshness he did not have in him.
“Then don’t forgive me. Hate me for as long as I may live, and take satisfaction in my ultimate death if that will appease you. And should Saitama ever be displeased with me, find that he no longer cares for me, then take your vengeance and destroy me as you wish. I will not fight you anymore. This world has grown too unstable for heroes to start fighting heroes.”
“You act like you could actually fight me. As if you could hold your own. Don’t delude yourself into thinking you’re strong. You have never posed a threat to me, and you never will, and if you can’t even touch me then you will never be anything remotely close to Saitama’s level.”
“I already know I will never match a strength such as his. I firmly believe no one in all existence will. He is beyond all of us, in ways so many don’t understand.”
“And yet he still troubles himself over garbage like you.”
“Yes. And I don’t know if I fully understand why. But so long as he does care about me, I will follow and wait for him until I perish.”
She looked at him with green eyes that had darkened, and he looked back steadily with the eyes that were made for him, but not the ones he was born with. She did not look old, but she did not look young. Small perhaps, but the curve of her frown and the dark circles practically tattooed under her eyes betrayed experience in an unkind life.
“Then you can wait some more. Leave, and don’t come back. You don’t belong here.”
His body was flung easily back into the elevator, and held there by force unseen. As the doors slid shut he released a shout back to her.
“Neither does Saitama! Neither do you!”
He had no way of knowing if she heard him, but he hoped she and all the security cameras had.
~
“I don’t understand, cant you stay here and still search for leads on the cyborg? Why go away?”
Mumen Rider took a large sip of his drink, swallowing thickly at the burn of the liquid. His and Genos’ food lay untouched.
“I stopped receiving any kind of leads only a few years after I arrived here. This place has no more information to give, and no online or digital methods have led to any success. The only way to find what I am looking for is to go and actually find it myself.”
“But you’re needed here! You’re a hero, aren’t you?”
Genos thought about that. Mumen seemed confident on the answer, but he had always seen the better parts of everyone. His gift was his kindness, his power was an unwavering good when faced with so much bad. But Genos had never considered himself a hero until Saitama had them both register as heroes. Even then, Genos considered it the name of an occupation he was temporarily in. he was a cyborg of justice, alone and determined. But he did wear the title of hero. He saved people, protected, defeated, sacrificed. But did that make him a hero?
“This isn’t about being a hero. This is about something different. This is something I have chased and been haunted by for almost half my life. I cannot live fully until this is taken care of.”
“But what about the people that rely on you? What about Saitama? Does he know?”
“Other heroes can protect the people. I’m not the only one here who fights evil. You’ll still be fighting.”
“Genos, you didn’t answer. Have you told Saitama all this?”
“I have not been able to, no.”
Mumen covers his face with his hands and inhales deeply before facing Genos again.
“But you are going to tell him, right?”
Silence. Genos began examining his cup as though it were the most fascinating object in the world.
“Genos, part of keeping a relationship healthy is communication. Now I know your relationship with him is, well, different considering the circumstances, but if you both love each other than you have to be honest. If you left without telling him, it would break his heart!”
“If I tell him, he might tell me to stay.”
“Well I’m sure he would want yo-
“You don’t understand. If he told me to stay, I would. I would do anything he asked. That’s why I think I should leave without telling him.”
“…But Saitama knows how important this is to you. He wouldn’t want to get in your way, he’d want to support you. Please Genos, don’t make someone else explain why you’re gone. It…it would be cruel.”
And Genos could see it too. He had already imagined it, felt his mental heart bleed from it. The image of Saitama, breathing in the surface air, looking around for Genos, eager and almost happy. And then he wouldn’t find Genos, and he would worry. He would desperately search until someone told him Genos had gone, and then Saitama would be left alone, with nothing else to do but return to his prison.
It was indeed cruel.
“If I saw him again….I don’t know if I could bring myself to leave him.”
“He deserves a goodbye, Genos. Not a note or a message. Let him know that he is loved, please.”
The two sat in an uneasy silence, Mumen staring imploringly at Genos, as the cyborg kept his eyes on his cup.
“You really do care about him too, don’t you Mumen?”
Genos didn’t need to look up. He could feel the smile of the other man.
“Sometimes even the strongest heroes still need a little help. And I did promise to always help.”
Genos couldn’t help a small smile of his own. How he had managed to surround himself by people so caring was a mystery to him. It wasn’t like he deserved such a kindness.
But Saitama did. Because Saitama deserved the entire world and instead was offered a pile of dirt, from which he only took a handful of. Genos would wait, and tell his love with his own words. He had always waited, and he knew that he always would continue to wait for Saitama.
~
He had hoped to gather more courage, to find the right way of wording it, but the threat that shook the earth and demanded Saitama came only a few short days after his conversation with Mumen. Genos didn’t even need to engage in the battle, it was basically over by the time he got there. So instead he nervously fidgeted like a frightened child. He was so wound up he thought he might damage his own body.
“You kind of look like you’re gonna throw up.”
As Genos looked up a puff of smoke hit his face, and he was met by the red eyes of Zombie Man. The strange hero hardly interacted with others, and had only exchanged a handful of words with Genos.
“And you look like you’re on your way to lung cancer.”
The man just laughed humorlessly at him.
“Can’t kill what’s already dead. It’s a nice thought though.”
“If you desire death I could always try to help you with that.”
“What a charmer. You all nervous ‘cuz you’re finally gonna propose or what?”
Genos chocked on his own (artificial) saliva.
“What?!”
“Hey, just curious. Well good luck with whatever kid.”
Genos watched with wide eyes as the man casually walked away. Who just started a conversation like that so casually, and with someone they didn’t know?
“Genos!”
Genos whirled around, raising his arms in a half motion as his body made to jump away from the situation. But deep brown eyes held him steady, and his body gave in, relaxing just enough to appear normal.
“Is everything ok? You look li-
“I am leaving for a while sensei!”
Genos almost punched himself in the face. He seriously, seriously considered self-destructing.
“…What?”
The face Saitama wore was one of confusion rather than grief, which was understandable considering how Genos had blurted the words out so quickly. Now though, Genos had no plan of action. He didn’t know what to say or do. He didn’t know how to continue, he was frozen in place, and he mouth wouldn’t open.
“Ok…well, nice to see you too? I missed you.”
Genos felt the lips brush his cheek, and the warmth the man radiated. Genos was distracted for a moment, caught up in the light blush dusted across Saitama’s cheeks. But Saitama had completely missed what he had said. The words needed to be repeated.
“Wait, did you just say you’re leaving? Sorry, you just said it so fast, but, is that what you said?”
Or maybe he didn’t need to repeat himself. The confusion which had given way to adoration now showed unhappiness.
“…I did say that. I also missed you too, Saitama-sensei.”
“I-wait, you…Genos do you mean…what do you mean?”
There it was. The hurt so clearly written across his features, focused in his eyes. Genos had caused that hurt. He had given pain to the man he loved most in the world.
“Do you remember-
“I remember everything about you, get to the point! Are you really leaving?”
Taken aback by the sudden urgency and frustration in Saitama’s voice, Genos closed his mouth and started over. He was anxious, and scared.
“I am leaving to continue my search for the mad cyborg. I cannot continue to live like this until I finish this goal.”
It was dusk, and the sun was only just starting to set. It made Saitama’s features sharper than ever, more handsome every second.
“But…how long will that take?”
“I do not know. It could be weeks or years. I just don’t know.”
“I-Genos I can’t…I can’t leave.”
His voice sounded just like heartbreak, and Genos had to look at his hands to keep himself steady.
“I’m not asking you to. I knew I would have to do this on my own, sensei.”
Hands took his, gently, cautiously. Saitama was always so gentle with those hands on Genos.
“What if something happens to you? What if you get hurt and there’s no one to help?”
“This body has been practically destroyed at least a hundred time. It’ll be fine.”
“That body is your body Genos. It’s the exterior that holds who you are as a human. It holds the person I love.”
“We both know I haven’t been human for a very long time Saitama-sensei.”
“Why? Because you’re mostly metal? What even makes someone human? How do I classify as a human? How do Tatsumaki and Fubuki? How are any us really human if you make it black and white like that?”
“That’s different. You were born in the same body you have now. I removed myself from mine.”
“No. We all change over time, and out body changes with us. That’s what my body did when I became strong, and its what your body did when you were 15. These are just shells, Genos. Just exteriors. But they still hold us together, all the important parts. And sometimes we don’t belong in the bodies we were born in, but the body we end up in, the body we change to match the person we are, that’s the one you have to accept as part of yourself as a whole, not use it like a disposable tool.”
“Why does it matter? There isn’t anything in this body except my brain. That’s the only real part of me.”
“All of you is real. Everything I see and hear and touch is Genos, and I love all of it. I love how gentle your hands are and how bright you eyes are and how soft your lips are. I love the way you literally light up sometimes, and how much heat you give off. I love the fact that I’ve held your core in my hands and felt it react to me. I love every inch of who you are, Genos.”
Genos looked at Saitama, and he wondered how many times they had had this conversation with different words. How often Saitama told him he loved everything about him, and how often Genos told Saitama he loved everything about him, and yet it seemed neither fully believed the other. Or at the very least, neither appreciated themselves like the other did. For all the love Saitama’s eyes bored into Genos, Genos could not love himself the way Saitama loved him. He could not accept that he still counted as a human.
“I didn’t come here to argue about this with you. I love you, and I love that you think I’m something wonderful, but this is a goodbye for now. I have no idea what’s going to happen, or when I’ll see you next, but I can promise you that I will see you again. I used to think that this would be my ultimate goal, the one I lived for and died for, but I haven’t thought of it like that in so many years. Because in the end, my goal is to come home with you. You are my everything, and I’ll always come back to you, Saitama-sensei.”
Beautiful brown eyes closed as Genos leaned in to kiss the other man. It was returned fully, with all the sorrow of a last kiss within it.
“You always waited for me, the least I can do is wait for you. But when you come back, don’t come back in pieces ok?”
“I’ll come back. I love you, more than anything.”
Saitama kissed him one last time, whispering a final I love you into his neck, before both men parted, and for the first time, Saitama was left behind, watching the person he loved disappear into the world.
But Saitama was not as patient as the other, and his heart torn too confusingly. Thus the man turned away, walking back to his confined tiny life, missing the last glance given by golden eyes.
~
“You’re acting like a stupid kid. So your boyfriend went off for some destiny crap, who gives a shit. That guy can die in a hole for all I care.”
“Tatsumaki.”
“Now what?”
“Leave.”
“Excu-
“Get out. Now.”
She fought the fear that spread to the tips of her fingers from her heart at the glare he gave her, but the promise of a power that could not be matched shook her, and she retreated. She felt the eyes on her back as she exited, and felt the fear swallow her whole.
Saitama’s anger was jarring, was frightening and loud. But Saitama’s grief was quiet, unpredictable, and undoubtedly deadly if handled poorly.
His control kept him in check, but he was only human. He could not stop from feeling the pain.
~
Genos had committed almost every detail of his life to some sort of record. His journals overflowed with words and drawings, about the world around him, the experiences he had, the possible leads to his goal. But then there was Saitama, and Genos’ life became about nothing else. His strength above all else, and how he achieved it. In the early years he had recorded so much of the man that upon looking back, Genos found an enormous source of comfort examining the journals. The observations of Saitama were just that; observations. They were clear and accurate, and they were written by a very young man who had no idea he was falling in love. Genos envied the younger him, envied how he had so much time with Saitama to himself, so many moments of peace and ease he hadn’t even noticed before. Genos also berated his past self, looking at words of secret strength and possible power gaining methods and thinking fool, idiot, stupid, the man is right there and he is the one you need not power you cannot have and then he looked at himself and thought himself still a fool, still an idiot, still so stupid. He was leaving the most important thing behind for something that brought only pain, and he had chosen to do so himself.
His fingers traced drawings, traced the line of a jaw so lovingly it appeared almost as intimate as if the man drawn were there in flesh.
“You don’t have to leave and not come back until it’s over. You can go out and find leads and clues and come back with them. The process might even be faster.”
Genos turned to Kuseno, the doctor having snuck up silently in his wheelchair. He grew too tired too quickly these days, and though Genos hated the chair for what it stood for, he was glad the doctor took care of himself.
“If I came back with a lead that I didn’t follow, but rather gave to you, and it turned out to be accurate, I would have lost the chance I had by then. I need to pursue every possibility. I need to follow through with every detail. I need this to be over.”
The doctor nodded at this, but took in the view of Genos leaning over his older journals, leaning over the images of a person he loved so much it hurt. It made Kuseno want to cry for the boy he felt was practically his son.
“Why now, Genos? What brought on this sudden urgency?”
“It wasn’t that it was sudden, it was that it had been building up for so long that I couldn’t ignore it anymore. The original desire to avenge my family never left, it just became…softer. I stopped seeing their faces covered in blood and ash and started seeing the way they used to smile. I think it’s a sign that its time to move on, and to completely do that I need to face my demons.”
“So you believe you are ready to face the cyborg? Prepared to kill them?”
“Of course I am prepared to kill it. I’ve been waiting to kill it since the beginning. Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because they are not an ‘it’. They are still human. Just like you.”
“There’s no human left in that thing. What I’ll be facing is a monster, and I will do what I do with all monsters which have done wrong. I’ll destroy it.”
“If they’re fully functional in the way they were when they destroyed your town, then their brain will still be alive and working. I had wanted to save the brain, you know this. I had wanted to see if I could save the person who once was before the connection of body and mind malfunctioned and caused them to go mad.”
“And then what? You would sit them down for tea? Let them live a life without any consequences for what they did?”
“We cannot hold a mind with no control over its body accountable-
“I can, and I do. It destroyed my entire life, it murdered my family, and you’re defending it.”
“I’m only trying to show you that there’s more than one option, that killing isn’t the only option. I thought Saitama taught you about mercy?”
Of course Saitama had taught him mercy. He had taught Genos how to live again for fuck sake. But this was something that stretched beyond patience and mercy, something that had caused a pain so violent and left a scar that still stung and burned. This was the source of his pain.
“I cannot promise anything, doctor. When I find this cyborg, what I do will depend on the situation. But I can assure you that should I find this mad cyborg causing harm, acting as a threat to the world, then I will not hesitate. I will attack with the intention to kill.”
The doctor looked at Genos. What was in front of him was a man, strong and capable but fragile with emotion at his core. All Kuseno could see, all he had ever really seen was a boy who had lost his family, who was treated unfairly by fate, and who was in pain.
“I wont stop you, Genos. I want you to see me as a source of support, not someone holding you back.”
“Thank you. I will always remember that you gave me a new life, and helped me when I was alone. You never gave up on me, and I wont forget that.”
“Don’t speak like this is goodbye, Genos. You can thank me when this is over.”
With no more words spoken, Genos bowed low, and left. As his footsteps echoed down a hallway the doctor closed his eyes, remembering a boy with tear filled eyes and hands clenched in fists that never fully unclenched. He had mourned for that boy.
~
“Sensei, why do you choose to stay in City Z and not move into the apartment the association has for you?”
“Hmm? Eh, moving is a hassle. Plus, I’ve grown used to this place. It’s got some interesting memories at least. Why, do you want to move?”
Genos shook his head. He had no desire to go anywhere without Saitama. It was why he had declined his apartment as an S Class hero even when he still outranked Saitama. Now though, Saitama outranked him officially. But it hadn’t changed anything. Increased pay, yet always cutting coupons and looking for sales. Higher rank but still responding to the smaller threats. Still living on the outskirts of civilization, with a yellow suit and a white cape. Saitama just didn’t seem like he had any intention of changing, and for some reason Genos liked that.
“No, sensei. I was only curious.”
And his answer was gifted by a smile as warm as summer. The smile that made Genos swear his heart was real and racing in his chest, that made him believe he was capable of feeling emotions so strong they really were physical. The smile that always reminded Genos that he so completely loved the man that wore it.
“Well either was, it’s nice you stuck around. I’d really miss you if you left.”
~
Far away, a forest was burning. The smoke had been invisible in the night, but the glow of the fire, that had been unmistakable. It had drawn Genos across valleys and into the fire itself, which burned at only half the intensity of his eyes.
There was ash coating him and collapsing wood, crashes and cracking and smoke so suffocating he had to use an enhanced vision setting. But the world around him had no clues, only a different place left in ruins. For all he knew he was standing in the last remains of someone else who had witnessed the beginning of the fire.
He launched himself up, into cleaner air, looking, searching, hoping. He saw a world aflame that stretched past the eye. He saw death where there had once been life.
He followed the destruction, he inhaled the scent of dried blood.
~
Saitama thought he was a good man. He thought he did good things. But when the fight was over and all was left was silence and stares and weapons raised, he thought maybe he was not doing something so good. If it was good, it wouldn’t bring forth such bad reactions.
Maybe it would be better to stay still. Maybe it would be the good thing to do. Not the right thing, but the good thing. If he stayed in his box, no one would be upset with him. No one would get hurt because of him. No one would fear him.
“Whether you like it or not, you’ll be needed again. Are you seriously going to just sit here and ignore a threat to the world?”
She was always so unhappy. She did not smile with him, and most of the time he did not have the energy to fake a smile for her. He had underestimated how much Tatsumaki had cared for Bang. He had underestimated how much she would hate the world for his death. He had underestimated the power human connection held over hearts that were not so strong. He had misjudged his own heart. He had been betrayed by his own heart. He thought his heart had been strong, been toughened by the emptiness he had felt for so long. But his heart had been vulnerable. Love had made it open, made it feel too confident.
“I don’t know. But right now, the world doesn’t need me.”
Love was not a weakness, but it could still make a person feel weak.
“…No one really needs me.”
~
The only survivor was a man older than 80. Genos had searched for heartbeats, looked for heat signatures, and found only one among a town that must have held hundreds. He was still conscious, and despite stopping the bleeding, Genos knew the man would die.
“Please, tell me what happened. I want to help.”
The man shuddered violently, his breathing erratic and labored.
“…My d-daughter…”
“What happened? What came here?”
The man closed his eyes and struggled. Genos noticed the man was crying, the streaks leaving clean lines on his ash-covered skin.
“D-demon…the demon…killed my daughter…”
“What did the demon look like? Where did it go?”
“…It cam from nowhere…I heard it…scream-
The man leaned over and coughed, tinting the mud red, and Genos helped the man lie on his back.
“What did it look like? Please tell me anything you remember, please.”
The man opened his eyes to Genos, and Genos could tell the man was falling away, leaving his life. His eyes did not focus on anything.
“It screamed…I heard it scream…”
Genos waited, and the man breathes heavily, brokenly. His breathing became a little easier, and then stopped. Genos had seen enough people die to know when it was over. He closed the man’s eyes as gently as possible, and stood. He considered burying the man, but if he buried the one, he could not leave without burying them all.
He lifted the man’s body, and making his way into a house that had collapsed or been smashed, he laid the man near the middle. Moving away from the wreckage, he lifted his arm, and set fire to the structure that had probably only just stopped burning. Then he burned the next building, and the next, and every single one he saw. If he could not lay the bones to rest, then the least he could do was let the bones be free instead of broken. Then perhaps the next person who came would not have to see the blood, would not have to imagine the suffering.
“I hope your souls are safe.”
He whispered it into the embers that danced in his vision, and then he turned his back to the fire, and walked.
~
“Your body is art.”
He had whispered it against Genos’ neck, breathed it into his knuckles. He had spelled it out with his tongue on Genos’ chest.
“Saitama…”
Genos had been embarrassed, had felt overwhelmed. He wanted to hide his face in the strong collarbone of his love, had tried to, but was held back.
“Genos you are gorgeous.”
“It’s just metal-
“Its you, and its beautiful and I love it.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s you, Genos.”
Hands had touched every wire, every plate, every crevice and joint. The heat of each kiss burned, but without the contact the air felt like ice. Genos had closed his eyes, tried to image himself with human skin, with soft and gently curves and sweat instead of steam, of goose bumps instead of sparks. Would his flesh be harsh and solid, unrelenting like Saitama’s, or would it be softer, and give way to each touch?
“Do you want me to stop?”
So gently, so gentle it almost hurt. Words like feathers brushing his cheek, a voice more beautiful than any sunset. Eyes too soft, but too intense with emotion, too caring, too perfect.
“No, I just wish I felt human.”
“Can you still feel my touch though?”
“Yes, yes I can feel everything.”
“Then why don’t you feel human?”
“Because there’s no way for me to feel human to you.”
The kisses had lingered on his neck, had been swift on his head and cheeks, had devoured his lips.
“You feel perfect to me. You feel precious. You feel unique.”
Fingers slipped down clean metal arms, touched coarse, thick tubes of wires, held steel hands.
“I am artificial, I am not soft.”
“You are art. You are soft to me.”
“You’re too kind to me.”
“I love you.”
“And I love you. More than I can coherently articulate.”
Saitama would often refer to his core as his heart, and eventually Genos stopped correcting him. He pretended it beat to the same rhythm as Saitama’s.
~
There was a type of darkness that was so solid, so real in it’s suffocating completeness, that it could drive the strongest mind to panic, the calmest of hearts to fear, and instincts within every muscle of the body to run and never turn back.
Saitama, however, did not move. The power had gone out a few times before, but there was always a backup light that glowed an emergency red. This time, there was no backup light, nor any alarm. If the silence had been bad, then the darkness and silence combined was horrible. Nothing existed to the man other than the surface of the floor beneath him. Other than that, he was in a void, released from his prison only to fall into hell.
Closing his eyes made no difference. The blackness behind his eyelids was just as sure as the one beyond his open eyes. He did not fear the dark, perhaps because he no longer had any sense of fear for himself. Self-preservation was something only needed when there was a possible threat to the body, and when no threat could possible reach or even hope to harm such a body, the need did not exist. Flight or fight was only fight. There was no desire to run, only the thought to confront.
So Saitama did not move. He waited in the darkness and the silence for something to show, to give reason to the situation, or anything at all. But he had no way to track time other than seconds he could count in his head, and he had no one who would come to him and give light to him. When had he last left this place? When had he last fought something, or spoken to someone? Ah, but he supposed if there were real threats to the world and he was no longer responding, Tatsumaki would be summoned. He was no longer proving difficult to contain since he had chosen to remain contained. Was the reward for this behavior the freedom of Tatsumaki? The return of Tornado? If he remained in the depths of his own mind in the space so below the ground, would the world forget he ever existed?
Did he want the world to forget he existed though? Did he really want to live in a box until his death? But then again, what he wanted didn’t really matter. What mattered was that Genos was not there with him, stuck in the dark. Genos was free, he was doing what he had originally set out to do, finishing a goal he had worked towards long before Saitama. A goal that might take an entire lifetime to complete. A goal that when complete, might result in the realization that Genos did not need or want Saitama back in his life. And these were reasonable, these were understandable, acceptable, realistic even.
Saitama had always wondered why Genos had chosen him to love. It could only be his strength that had caused Genos to idolize Saitama, and for some reason the younger man still found interest in it, in Saitama. Of course it had been easy to love Genos, to love anyone who inserted themselves into one’s life and commit themselves to kindly to that person. Genos had become a reason to return home, he had taken the extra space, the empty space, and occupied it. So maybe Saitama would have fallen in love with anyone who had acted as Genos had and made Saitama happy by offering companionship, but it didn’t change the fact that it had been Genos he had fallen for. Maybe it was the attraction to someone broken in a very specific kind of way, or broken in a way so similar to the way Saitama was broken. Maybe it was the patience Genos gave Saitama, despite the fact that Saitama didn’t always give Genos the same patience. The reasons were so many and the possibilities just as endless as always, that Saitama couldn’t ever focus on just one.
His reasons for loving Genos always bordered on unending, yet it seemed the reasons for Genos loving Saitama were unrealistic and confusing. Why would anyone love a man who was so empty, who, in the end, had nothing there to love?
The darkness continued on as strongly as the silence did, and Saitama felt no urge to rise and no call to fight. He melded with the darkness, unseen, unattainable in his invisibility, and completely nonexistent in silence. If he could not be seen and could not be heard, perhaps he could be completely forgotten.
~
“The people of this town told me you could help me find what I am looking for.”
Genos knelt before the woman whose eyes were milky and sightless and whose skin was marked by an age far beyond normal life expectancy of a normal human. She looked at Genos as if she saw everything he was, and it unnerved him.
“You’re looking to seal a great wound with a very small bandage. You are being foolish.”
He was startled by how calm and oddly smooth her voice was. He had been expecting a raspy, small voice. But her words bothered him.
“I did not come here for vague fortune telling. I desire information. If you do not have any then I will leave.”
“The most powerful being in the universe, reduced to a hallow statue. And his lover could have saved him, but no, he walked away to tarnish his hands with blood.”
Genos stared back into the empty eyes of the woman, forbidding himself to fall for such flimsy so-called prophetic words. For all he knew the woman was talking about a story or just making things up on the spot.
“You’re wasting my time. Do you have any information about a mad cyborg?”
“Your family would weep if they saw the anger in your soul.”
“Do not-!
Genos stopped himself from lashing out. He would not prove this woman right by giving her the reaction she wanted. He felt himself steam in anger at her careless mention of his lost family. She did not know. His pain came from memories, not her.
“If defeating violence with violence is your only solution, I pity you and your lover. You will find what you seek to the east, but you can do much greater good in the north of the west.”
If he went northwest he would eventual find himself closer to city Z. He had left there by going a steady south. He wondered if the woman actually knew that her directions were somewhat valid. Her eyes were not focused, most likely unable to focus, but still they seemed to pierce Genos.
He had no way of knowing if she spoke the truth. She spoke confidently, but with words that sounded like that of any crazed old blind woman. But he had no other lead to follow, and no other words to rely on.
“Thank you for your time. I hope what you have told me will lead me to my goal.”
“Do not forget about your lover. Do not leave him alone to perish.”
He answered on instinct, barely even thinking about it.
“I wont. I promised.”
~
It had been a day the same as before, and even before that. Nothing had changed, while at the same time everything shifted. Changing was too drastic a word, change implied a difference, a disruption even. But it was only a shift in his life, like the gentle push of wind. Nothing earth-shattering, nothing explosive, nothing mind-blowing. Just a very small shift.
Saitama loved Genos.
It was as easy to admit as it was to announce the forecast of the day. Yes, it might rain today, he should bring an umbrella out with him, and he loved Genos. Not only that, but all he had to do was look and suddenly it became clear as day that Genos loved him back. There was just enough self-consciousness in Saitama to still make him question it, to make him think ‘we’re just really good friends, Genos just admired me’ but there was also a solid amount of curiosity to drive Saitama into action. If he opened his eyes and really, really looked, he would see.
When his touch lingered, Genos fumbled. When he got close and stayed close, Genos steamed with heat. When he ruffled the blond hair, just barely scratching the scalp, he swore Genos all but melted to the touch. When Saitama had noticed a stain on the cyborg’s cheek, he calmly pointed it out, licked his thumb, and cleaned it away. A gesture quite intimate, somewhat obvious, and it had left Genos to stare with dilated pupils and a slightly open mouth. And Saitama had only smiled and walked away.
But those were just the little parts. The proof that Genos at the very least had a crush on Saitama. The love came from the other things. It was hidden in words like thank you and goodnight, and packed into gestures and actions. The smiles, the hidden chuckles, the preparation of a certain food, the unexpected little gifts, the cautious yet somehow desperate moments of contact that ended in seconds. The way Genos valued his words, not just the ones about heroics and training, but the ones just for Genos. The words of encouragement, of thanks, of happiness. Genos cherished them, held them in his own way, and accepted them like a starving man accepted food and drink.
Watching Genos while actually looking for the signs, Saitama found the love that had been obvious from the start, but perhaps had just been so bright he had turned his head and shielded his eyes. Now he stared into that light, and was indeed blinded and shocked by it. He thought his love had been surprisingly overwhelming. But Genos’ love had larger than anything Saitama could provide.
Saitama would eat his hero suit before he let Genos go unappreciated, and he decided he would eat both his hands if he let Genos love Saitama more than Saitama could love Genos back. He started doing all the unnecessary things Genos did for him, but for Genos. And he did them not to be competitive, not to prove something, but because he wanted to. And he wasn’t ready to say it out loud, and clearly Genos wasn’t ready either, but if Genos could pour his heart into actions and simple phrases then Saitama would do so as well. And maybe, where he had been oblivious, Genos would be perceptive. That was all he wanted.
For Genos to feel loved.
~
A man sat in a cage made of cardboard with the lock made of paper. He had all the power to free himself, yet inside he remained. Breaking the cage was easy. Destroying it would be effortless. But if he got out, there was just another cage outside, only bigger. And beyond that, an even larger cage, and after still another. So the man thought, should he stay in his breakable little cage with the illusion of freedom, knowing he could get out but just chose not to, or should he get out of the little cage and try to break through all the endless containments trying to hold him?
But what was the point?
~
It had all begun with fire.
The fire that had burned and destroyed his home, that had exploded and killed, that had turned to ash atop his blood stained body.
The fire that he was able to release from his palm, incinerate his enemies, clear his path.
The fire in his core that grew from hate and thrived on anger.
But it did not end in fire.
It had ended on moss as soft as featherbeds with streams as clear as glass. In a forest untouched by anything except the footprints larger than anything normal which had been grown over and cleaned with grass. Only the curves of metal and dangling wires showed the truth underneath greenery. It was a resting place far from the human world, and more quiet than even the most abandoned city.
And it was this undeserved peace that brought forth the rage of Genos and all the fire in his body.
“GET UP!!!”
The wires flickered with the heat and the green turned to brown, then black, and then to nothing but ash in the air. Trees collapsed, and the streams boiled and evaporated. The flesh of animals melted onto cracking bones, and the stench of their death joined the ashes in the air.
“WAKE UP!! WAKE THE FUCK UP!!!”
The eyes were black, not red. They were lifeless but oh, he remembered those eyes. You will always remember the eyes of the devil that tries to send you to hell.
A scream of utter torture carries through the smoke and as Genos looks for the source he realized he is making the sound. He screams and screams and screams until static comes out instead of a voice and oil does not drip from his eyes because it evaporates in the heat.
“FI-GHT M-E-E!! GET U-P!”
His eyes sting with the extremity of the heat flowing from his body, and he sees the warning text and ignores. His vision is only of red.
The man screams until his voice cannot function and his mouth simply opens in silence. His eyes still remain closed and oil still evaporated on his cheek, but the artificial skin is cracking, breaking under the temperature. His clothes are long reduced to nothing, his hair singed and smoking. He is the image of a demon bathed in flame and brining forth hell. He burns from the pain of his past and present, and the object of his despair remains motionless, rusting on the ground.
Knees hit parched earth, metal and smooth, and the fire burns but is no longer pushed and fueled. Minutes fall away like the leaves and hour pass with the wind. A boy saw the face of his past, burning. He saw life end easier than the igniting of a match, saw the way a persons eyes stilled in death and watched his own body empty of more blood than he thought he contained. He raised his eyes to the sky, but even that was burning in clouds of embers. He asked why and the universe gave no answer. It never did.
~
He sat with his back to the wall and his eyes unfocused as ever. His face had a thinness to it that overpowered the softness in him, only bringing forth the hard-edged. The woman had hair that was beginning to gray with the extremity of her stress, despite being on the younger side of middle aged. She wore unhappiness like others wore jackets.
“You have nothing left now.”
A crisp, harsh phrase, yet it flowed from her lips seamlessly. She had grown used to delivering the news no one wanted to hear. Misery and pain did not faze her. She had long ago learned she could only rely upon herself, and thus there was no one who could cause her such emotions except herself. Her sister was safe, but even her sister chose others above Tatsumaki. There was no one.
“He’ll come back. I know he will.”
He said this with a truly certain attitude. What reason had Genos ever given to make him doubt the younger?
“You have nothing in this world. Why bother living?”
“I told Genos I would wait for him. That is a reason worth living.”
“That’s a pathetic reason for existence.”
“Do you want me to die that badly?”
“I don’t care what you do. Your life is meaningless to me.”
This was a lie they both knew. She relied enormously on the man that listened where no one else did. He was a kindness she had never believed in, but at the same time refused to believe.
“If you could, would you kill me?”
And the silence that followed gave no answer, because in truth, neither knew the answer anymore.
~
On the third ring it picked up.
“Genos?”
“I found it.”
“…What happened?”
“It was already dead.”
“What? You mean-
“I was too late. I failed.”
He ended the call and let his mouth close, lock, and clench. He did not need food to sustain his body, and the charred log behind his back was all he needed to convince him that not moving was a good idea.
The steel body meters from his haunted his vision and no, he could not leave. He could not go back. He was lost in this forest of dead trees and broken will.
~
It might have been years. It seemed as though it had been. The sunset was the most beautiful thing he had seen, but all he thought when he saw it was Genos.
He didn’t remember why he had come up, he only remembered suddenly being above. But it was peaceful here. There was no monster, no screaming, no glares. And he saw the sun setting on a world he had almost forgotten, and he felt his heartbeat he had thought was too quiet to be heard. He almost wanted to laugh. The only one who could ever get him to feel human was a cyborg. He didn’t understand himself anymore. Didn’t understand why of all times he chose to leave, when he was not needed even in the slightest. Was this his rebellion? Or was it instinct, telling him to get out and away from his cage?
The push of something small and cold make him turn, looking at a tiny drone with a large black lens. It hummed like something familiar, and it hovered in the air up to his face he was tempted to swat it away. He wanted to watch the sunset.
“Sai-ta-ma”
If this was a new security measure, he didn’t really understand the idea behind it.
“Sai-ta-ma”
It repeated itself, its lens moving and focusing on his face.
“Yeah, its me. I’m Saitama.”
“Sai-ta-ma”
“What, is this me being told to go back?”
“Sai-ta-ma”
“I’ll be down in a minute, just leave me alone.”
It was quiet, thankfully. But the sun had already set, and only the glow remained, illuminating clouds with pinks and oranges.
“Identity match. Saitama.”
He snorted at the thing. If it hadn’t known it was him, why go about calling his name?
“Message from Doctor Kuseno. Message to identity name Saitama.”
What?
“Go to lab. Help needed. Message received.”
And without anymore warning than that, the drone fell to the ground in pieces, left to be buried in the dirt. And the man Saitama was gone, far away and moving through air to a place he had been to time and time again.
~
“Genos, do you remember your past?”
“I remember parts. Most are unclear.”
“Do you think that’s better or worse, not remembering?”
Their hands were only inches away at the time. But inches on a map are days worth of travel, and countries apart.
“I think it is better. The parts I remember only make me unhappy. If I could I would forget most of my past.”
“Wait, but, don’t you have good memories?”
“Yes sensei, but they are the most painful.”
~
The beginning of new plants grew around his legs and tangled in his fingers. They fed from his heat, from the reflection of light he created. The plants were orphaned children, clinging to their parent’s murderer. But they still grew, little by little around a body that watched but did not move at all. His mind slipped in and out of consciousness, but always he woke to the sight of a burnt world with the corpse of a once mad cyborg. The new life around him mocked his loss. It grew from the ashes he had created, while he the destroyer lay to be overwhelmed and considered his life. The past memories of a different time merged with ones he had had recently. Human and cyborg, unable to differentiate in his mind. Had he ever been a real human? Had it been a dream? Would he sleep on this earth and join his enemy in a sleep he would not wake from?
He closed his eyes and allowed the sleep to wash over his brain. He was too tired, too tired of everything.
The sound of wood crunching under feet did not disturb him. Anyone that came could do as they pleased. He had nothing to say to a stranger. But the feet still stopped before his body, and though he knew he was being observed, he let his eyes remain closed and his mind fogged.
The presence of a body lying on the dead trunk he himself lay on did not shock him. It was a nice place to rest. Anyone was allowed to sit and rest. But the stranger began untwisting the plants from his fingers, and why would someone do that? Let them grow, let them use him, leave it be.
“I love these hands too much to leave them to the plants.”
And he knew that voice, and he knew the touch. He knew those hands, he knew the fingertips and the veins and the bones. He loved the hands that held his.
“Why are you here?”
His voice was low and rough from disuse, and his eyes were slow to open.
“Because you’re here.”
Always the most simple of answers, the direct announcements of love said like they were the most obvious things in the world.
“I’ve failed them all. Saitama, I failed.”
The brown eyes he loved came closer and closer, until foreheads connected and all he could see was the reflection of his inhuman eyes in pupils that were large and kind.
“No, you’re wrong. There was nothing for you to fail at.”
How tired he sounded. There was a world balanced on his shoulders, and he refused to put it down.
“I was too late, I wasn’t able to avenge them…”
“But it’s over. They can’t hurt anyone anymore.”
“My goal, my purpose…I don’t…know anymore.”
“It’s ok to not know. I never really know. But I’ll be by your side, ok? And we’ll move forward together, when you’re ready.”
“…I’m scared to move forward. I’m afraid.”
Eyes closed gently and black tears fell silently. A kiss was left on his head, and his hand was lifted to lips. Each finger was kissed so softly, every knuckle and joint, the curve of the metal palm, the wrist where veins should be.
“It’s ok to be scared, Genos. It’s human.”
Genos sobbed with his eyes closed and his head tilted down, the flow of tears dripping onto the plants that had only just begun to grow, staining them, poisoning them. He cried for his family, he cried for his lost past, he cried for himself, he cried for the people he hadn’t saved. He cried, feeling the hate ease from his grip, slipping away despite how strongly he tried to hold it. The anger left, and Genos felt the space being filled. It hurt, but he had love, he had his love inside him and it burned so much brighter than all the hatred. He was afraid, and there was more pain than anything, but a hand held his and a soft, kind, beautiful voice whispered tenderness into his ear.
“Genos I love you, I’m here for you, and it’s going to be ok. I love you so much, and you’re so amazing. Genos you’re so strong, so selfless. I love you, I’m here for you, I love you.”
The world was hidden from his eyes as his head was held to a chest, gentle fingers combing through his hair, as if holding something precious. He felt every snap of the stems breaking as his body was moved, the plants separating from his limbs. He was safe in the arms of Saitama. He was broken and hurt and lost but here he was safe, and here he was loved.
“Please take me home. I want to go home.”
If he said the words aloud, he didn’t remember. But in and out of awareness he was held and carried. In the shelter of the person he loved, he was already home.
~
“I think, I am very glad I became a cyborg, Saitama-sensei.”
“Oh? Did you get a new upgrade or something?”
And he smiled when Saitama smiled, a mirror of contentment.
“No. I’m just very glad we met, and we would not have met had I been human.”
Flustered. He could see cheeks turning pink.
“I see you as human though. Besides, you’re too nerdy to be anything but human.”
“I fail to see how I qualify as a ‘nerd’ sensei.”
The quiet laugh. A miniature symphony.
“It’s not really a bad thing. In fact, I’d say I definitely have a thing for the nerdy type.”
“Is that implying you have a ‘thing’ for me, sensei?”
“It means I’m really glad we met too. And I love you.”
A kiss. A beautiful gift.
“I love you too. And thank you.”
“For what?”
For everything. For nothing. For it all.
“For making me feel human.”