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The news was just announcing Akira’s suicide when Niijima Sae walked in, and Sojiro’s first thought was fuck, I’m too old for this.
He’d known something was wrong when Futaba came storming through the door like a one-woman hurricane after whatever the Phantom Thieves were doing at the Diet Building, of all places. Usually when that group finished their ~clandestine activities~ there (or after their previous heists, too, as Sojiro had only recently started to realize), Akira would walk Futaba home as she slumped against him and complained alternately about being starving or exhausted. Sometimes he’d carry her, draped over his shoulders like a koala.
This was the first time she’d come home alone, brow furrowed as she made a beeline for her room. Sojiro had barely managed to catch her in the doorway, a pit already forming in his stomach at Akira’s noticeable absence. “Futaba,” he’d said, when she tried to yank her arm out of his grasp, “what happened? Where’s Akira?”
“It’s fine,” Futaba stressed, gaze already fixed on her computer. This explained exactly nothing, which Sojiro guessed he should have expected. “I’m gonna handle it, and it’s gonna be fine.”
“Futaba,” Sojiro repeated, and she finally turned to look at him.
He remembered Wakaba’s eyes, the day she’d told him she was going to die. There was an odd resignation there, a desperation that had rusted over into terrible certainty, and she’d smiled at him with a shaking grip on her drink.
There was none of that in Futaba’s expression. Her jaw was set, burning gaze locked directly on Sojiro’s eyes in the way she always avoided if she could help it. “I’m going to handle it,” she repeated firmly. “I can do it, Sojiro, trust me.”
And, well, if Sojiro had learned anything about Futaba in the time he’d known her, it was that once she had her mind set on something, there wasn’t a thing anyone could do to sway her. (Short of stealing her heart, apparently.) He sighed and let go of her. “Alright. How can I help?”
Futaba grinned at him, mischief and — a bit of relief, surprisingly; Sojiro supposed she was still a kid looking for validation even if she was skilled enough to take down the whole country with her cell phone — coloring her face. “Curry!” she demanded instantly. Sojiro blinked at her. “And lots of it!” Futaba continued. “It’s an essential part of my mission!”
Sojiro had chuckled and acquiesced, making her a huge pot of curry and letting her get to work.
She was still at it when he left to open the cafe that morning, on assurances that “yes, you absolutely should open it, it’ll be suspicious if you don’t!”
And thus, he was standing at the counter when the TV started talking about Akira’s arrest — and all Sojiro could think was he’s definitely not getting off with probation again — and then “arrest” turned to “suicide” and Sojiro felt terribly cold, suddenly.
“Is everything alright?” a voice asked, and Sojiro jolted as he turned to the source of the voice. Ah, yes, the older couple that liked to come in around that time. The wife was watching him with concern creasing the edges of her expression.
He cleared his throat before nodding. “I was just surprised by the news,” he explained, and then Niijima Sae had strolled right through the door like she owned the damn place.
Needless to say, the cafe was closed pretty soon after. Sojiro had claimed a family emergency, and while the couple had grumbled they’d left fairly quickly, making room for Niijima and Akira, swaying on his feet and looking a bit like he’d jumped in front of a truck.
Sojiro had so much he wanted to say: where have you been, they said you killed yourself, what happened to you, are you okay, this is enough, you need to stop before you die for real. He said none of these things.
“You look like shit,” he greeted instead.
Akira wheezed a laugh and a “You should see the other guy,” easy as anything. The smile split his scabbed-over lip, sending blood dribbling down his chin, but he just scrubbed at it with a sleeve. His expression never wavered.
Sojiro raised an eyebrow into a neat arc, perfected after months of dealing with an ever-growing cast of idiot teenagers. “Why don’t you go lay down,” he suggested, “and Miss Prosecutor and I can have a little chat.”
“Fine by me,” Akira said, shrugging and wincing at the motion. He then proceeded to wobble his way out of the kitchen as Sojiro watched with increasing concern.
He turned to Niijima, brow lowered. “What happened,” he demanded.
Niijima bit her lip and looked down at her watch. “I…” She glanced back up at Sojiro, offering him the best imitation of a sympathetic expression he suspected she could produce. She obviously wasn’t used to it — too much time spent chasing the answers she’s looking for to remember what it’s like to deal with people as people. “I can’t stay long. The drugs they gave him have mostly worn off, so he’ll likely sleep for a while. Just...keep him safe. Please.”
“Of course I’m gonna keep him safe,” Sojiro snapped back, caught off-guard by his own indignance at the request, “what do you take me for?! That’s why I want to know what the hell happened to him.”
“It...wasn’t a typical interrogation,” Niijima non-answered, crossing her arms protectively over her chest. “He’s made a lot of people in very high places very upset.” She paused. “I’ll be by tomorrow evening. Thank you, Sakura-san.”
“Don’t thank me for doin’ my damn job,” Sojiro grumbled, waving her out.
He had a feeling Akira might be passed out in bed already when he headed for the stairs, so he was somewhat surprised to find the kid hunched over on a step halfway up, head between his knees. In different circumstances, Sojiro would have accused him of eavesdropping, but…
“Get stuck, didja?” he asked conversationally. Akira didn’t move. He just heaved another laugh, this one much harsher. Like swallowing glass.
Sojiro frowned, taking the few steps up that he needed to reach Akira and lay a hand on his back. They both ignored the way Akira flinched at the motion. “C’mon,” Sojiro said, “I’ll help ya up.”
Akira (begrudgingly) agreed, sitting up dizzily and letting Sojiro pull him to his feet. He leaned more of his weight on Sojiro than Sojiro had planned for, but after a moment to readjust he managed to get them both up the stairs and over to the bed without any world-shattering catastrophe.
“D’nt tell F’taba,” Akira pleaded with him as they got him settled down on the mattress. Sojiro, for what would certainly not be the last time, regretted not getting a proper bed up into the attic space before now.
He supposed he could have reminded Akira that Futaba had any number of bugs all around the downstairs cafe, and that she had certainly heard that he was back, and that he should have known this, but he at least had the mercy to let the poor kid live in his illusion for a few hours while he was in pain and drugged, apparently, Sojiro’s going to strangle whoever did this to a fucking teenager if he has to march his retiree ass down to the Prosecutor’s Office to do it.
“I won’t tell her,” he promised. “I’m not tellin’ anyone anything ‘till Niijima says it’s safe to.”
Akira relaxed — perhaps slumped is more accurate, like a puppet with cut strings — onto the bed at that. “Okay,” he rasped, “okay. So I have until she comes back tomorrow.”
He was clearly talking to himself more than to Sojiro, but Sojiro gave him a reassuring nod nonetheless. “Right,” he said. “So go ahead and get some rest.”
Akira blinked up at him, a question he surely wasn’t going to ask sitting in his expression. He was never this easily read before, but Sojiro was grateful for it now.
“I’m gonna open the cafe back up,” he added, promising, “I’ll wake you up before I go. Get some shut-eye, kid, you’ve earned it.” Akira nodded and shifted somewhat, trying and failing to get comfortable on the makeshift bed. He was out like a light in seconds.
Sojiro went back to work, letting himself get lost in thought as he poured coffee and made curry and engaged in idle weather chit-chat.
He thought about Akira and Futaba, the night Sojiro had shown them the calling card. Akira stepping in on Futaba’s behalf, his quiet determination, the unrepentant sorry for keeping quiet as he’d nudged his shoulder against hers in the booth.
Akira the night Futaba’s uncle had come crashing into the cafe. Stepping in front of her, again, undeterred and unshaken even when Youji had threatened legal action.
Akira with his teammates, Akira with Futaba, Akira alone in the cafe. Always with that same poker face: a distant stare, a quiet grin…
Akira in the bed upstairs, practically begging Sojiro not to let Futaba see him weak.
Sojiro found himself wandering back upstairs to check on Akira as soon as there was a lull in customers (not that he got many anyway). Akira was curled around himself in the bed, tangled up in the sheets and breathing heavily. Some of his bruises were already starting to darken.
“How’d I end up with such troublesome kids?” Sojiro asked the air above Akira’s head. He wondered if he was this troublesome when he was a teenager. He imagined Wakaba would laugh at him for asking.
Absently, he let his fingers trace Akira’s bruised face, brushing away a lock of curled hair from where it’d gotten stuck to his face with sweat. Akira made a soft noise in his sleep as he leaned into the touch, and Sojiro did his best to shove down the knot it tied in his chest right where his lungs should be.
He put a pot of okayu on the stove as closing time approached, bringing it upstairs once he was able to chase the last of his customers out. Akira was just starting to stir, blinking dazedly at Sojiro as he came up the stairs and set the bowl in front of him.
Akira stared at the bowl dubiously, eyes flicking between it and Sojiro. “It’s not gonna bite you,” Sojiro said dryly.
“...It’s not curry,” Akira responded, poking at the bowl with the spoon like it’d explode if he wasn’t careful. “Is it edible?”
Sojiro snorted despite himself, reaching forward to ruffle Akira’s hair once he was sure the kid wouldn't be surprised by the motion. Less of a flinch this time — he decided to call that progress. “Glad you’re feeling well enough to be an ass,” he said. Akira offered him something shaped vaguely like a grin and took a spoonful of the okayu.
Sojiro leaned against the shelving unit, watching him eat. Briefly, he wondered if he’d been fed between his arrest and his arrival here, then decided he probably didn’t want to know the answer to that. “Listen,” he said instead, “why don’t you come back to our place tonight? You’ll probably want to clean up, and you don’t want to show up to the bathhouse looking like you lost a fight.”
Akira snorted into his okayu. “Futaba’s gonna freak out.” Sojiro figured that’d be the answer. Akira had already had this conversation with him, after all, albeit less coherently.
Still. “She’ll probably be happier to see you alive and safe than anything else,” he pointed out. “I’m assuming she knew this…” He gestures vaguely at Akira. “...was the plan, so I’m sure she’s anxious to hear from you now that you’re up and at it.”
“I’ll shoot her a text,” Akira offered, watching Sojiro carefully. His expression was shuttered in a way Sojiro hadn’t seen in a while — months, if he thought about it — like he was preparing for a fight, or a betrayal.
Sojiro sighed. “Well, I’m not gonna make you do anything you don’t want to. I promised I wouldn’t say anything without your permission.” Akira relaxed slightly at that. “I just thought you might not want to sleep here by yourself, after everything,” he added.
Akira’s gaze flicked down to his bowl, shoulders slumping a fraction of a centimeter. Sojiro hated seeing him look so downtrodden. Especially knowing that he was a cause of it, even if just by trying to offer solutions.
The room was silent for a beat, two. Sojiro let out a breath and stood up straight again. “I’m going to start closing up,” he said. “Let me know if you change your mind.”
Akira nodded wordlessly and handed Sojiro back the half-eaten okayu bowl. Sojiro took it off his hands before heading downstairs to do dishes and get the cafe ready for closing, head a thousand miles away.
He wasn’t quite sure what to expect from Akira, but he was definitely relieved to find him lurking at the bottom of the stairs with a backpack when the time came to lock up. Sojiro tried to offer him a smile. “Think you can walk there, or do you want me to bring the car around?” It wasn’t a far walk, even on Sojiro’s old bones, but he didn’t want Akira’s condition worsening.
“I can walk,” Akira said, shifting uncertainly. “It’s not...I slept the, uh...the drugs off, so.” He was still holding himself carefully, but Sojiro doubted he’d take kindly to too much more coddling.
“Suit yourself,” he said, waving him along and heading for the door.
Akira took off with surprising speed towards Sojiro’s bathroom the second they were in the door, narrowly evading Futaba as she came running to meet them. This meant Sojiro was left to catch her as she came skidding into the entryway, looking around for Akira with wide eyes. She gave Sojiro a bewildered look, which Sojiro answered with a tired shrug. “He’s going to clean up.”
Futaba glanced back in the direction of Sojiro’s room, brows knitting together. “H-how is he?” she asked, voice low.
“He walked here,” Sojiro offered, “and he kept his food down.” That was really the most optimistic assessment he could provide her with — and she clearly recognized it, if the way her shoulders curled inward was any indication.
“I—” she started, but her voice cracked on the syllable as she bowed further into herself, head falling. Akira’s cat wound its way between her legs, meowing insistently, but she hardly seemed to notice it. Sojiro moved without thinking, stepping forward to wrap an arm around her.
“He doesn’t blame you for what happened at all,” he said. If all of his worry about Futaba seeing him down meant anything at all, surely that was it. “So don’t beat yourself up, alright? He’s twitchy enough as is.” Futaba choked out a laugh that sounded more like a sob, but leaned into Sojiro’s side nonetheless. Sojiro rubbed her arm comfortingly, trying to think. It was surprisingly hard to be mature about things when both of your kids were tiptoeing along the edge of a crisis situation.
“He’s staying the night,” he finally said, “so why don’t you give him some company? That’d probably be the best thing for him right now.”
Futaba contemplated this for a while, her shaking leveling off. Eventually she gave one last sniffle and stepped away, rubbing at her eyes firmly. Her glasses were still smeared with tears, but she didn’t pay it any mind as she fixed Sojiro with a shaky grin. “I need every blanket we have.”
Sojiro was mostly content to watch as Futaba raced around the house with the cat on her heels, gathering blankets and pillows into a fairly formidable nest on the couch. How she still had that much energy after pulling an all-nighter like that, he had no idea. Nerves, probably. Sojiro himself still felt a bit like marching down to the Prosecutor’s Office and raising hell, but he settled for casting occasional glances at the clock and wondering how long he should wait before assuming Akira had passed out in the shower.
He was just on the verge of going to check when Akira made his reappearance, swaying on his feet but still standing. Sojiro was briefly possessed by the urge to storm over to him and dry his hair off properly, but that would probably have weirded the kid out even under these circumstances.
Futaba beat him to the punch, anyway, whirling the second Akira stepped into the room and leaping into some video game pose that Akira apparently recognized enough to make a half-hearted attempt at returning. Futaba grinned at that, bouncing over to him and chattering a mile a minute about the success of their grand plan.
The details of it flew way over Sojiro’s head, especially at the late hour of nine P.M., so he turned his gaze to Akira instead. He definitely looked better after the shower, cuts cleaned of dried blood and hair no longer plastered to his face. He was smiling at Futaba, too, tired but far softer than the lazy grin he’d offered Sojiro in the kitchen. It was definitely better to bring him here, then, rather than leave him to sit in the dark in Leblanc all alone.
He still looked like he was going to collapse any second, though, so eventually Sojiro cut off Futaba’s tangent with, “So, is there a reason you tore up the whole house for blankets?”
Futaba blinked owlishly at him for a moment, before snapping her fingers. “Right, yeah, Akira!” She half-led-half-dragged Akira towards the couch, explaining her grand design: a victory blanket nest, the perfect base for a victory Neo Phoenix Ranger Featherman marathon rewatch.
Also the perfect base for Akira to pass out again, as Sojiro could read in his expression in the split second before he turned to her with a smirk and said, “Fine, but we’re starting with episode six.”
Futaba made a grand display of rolling her eyes. “Ugh, you really like Grey too much,” she groused, already diving into the nest.
Akira sat down heavily next to her, letting her bury him in blankets with a shake of his head. “It’s also the episode that establishes how well Red and Blue work together,” he pointed out. The cat, clambering immediately into his lap, yowled in what must have been agreement, considering Futaba’s scowl.
“Episode four does that better, plus you get the first hints of Green’s backstory!” she argued. “She’s barely even in six!”
Sojiro was officially lost now, so with a shake of his head he stepped out of the kitchen. “Goodnight, you two,” he said, heading towards his room. “Get some sleep, alright?” That last statement was accompanied by a pointed look at Futaba which went blithely ignored.
“G’night, Sojiro!” Futaba chirped. Akira offered him a tired wave before turning back to arguing the merits of various Featherman episodes.
Sojiro shook his head with a smile, heading for his room to start getting ready for bed. The exhaustion of the day only hit him once the door was shut, leaving him alone to think, Holy shit.
Is this what they’re all facing, all the time? Did they plan for this, was this the best option?
Are these kids going to die without having anyone to protect them?
And the worst part was that Sojiro knew there was nothing he could do to help. He couldn’t talk them into stopping now, nor could he come with them and stand in between them and whatever was hurting them. All he could do is watch and pray and trust that they were capable enough to handle themselves. And at the end of it, he could be there waiting with warm food and open arms to give them somewhere soft to land.
That’d have to be enough.
He took his time getting ready for bed, trying to let the familiar routine settle his nerves, and stepped out once more to check on Futaba and Akira right before going to sleep for real. As he expected, they were both dead asleep, slumped over each other and the cat in a mess of tangled limbs while Featherman blared on in the background.
Sojiro chuckled softly, stepping forward to turn the TV down and pull blankets over the both of them. Neither of them so much as twitched. He would have to figure out a good reward for their hard work once the morning came. For now, he just murmured, “Good night,” and turned out the lights.