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Reigen Arataka usually did not let life get him down. He did not allow life to get him down. He was a busy person, he had a busy life, and no one who was busy had time to let life get them down. Arataka was busy going to school, buying some of the cat-safe milk from the nearby konbini for the stray cats that liked to follow him around, busy taking tests, busy helping his mom out at home, busy ensuring that he was getting good grades at school, busy making the cat-safe milk for the kittens in the box near the school–
Point blank, Reigen Arataka was a really busy person, and had really no reason to be down.
It wasn’t like he had been thinking about taking the kittens to a safe shelter later today. It wasn’t like seeing them was a highlight of his day. So finding out that they had been taken wasn’t such a big thing. It really wasn’t. Arataka was really too busy anyways, so this was the better option.
For him and the kittens. They didn’t get attached, he didn’t get attached.
This was the better option.
It wasn’t like he was lonely at school. He saw everyone in his class everyday Monday through Friday. They were Nice. They talked to him in between classes for the most part. The teachers made sure that the class president and vice president passed everyone all the papers and didn’t skip him over. They made sure to try and include him on school-related stuff, like clubs. But Arataka didn’t really see the point in clubs. Not when. . . . when everyone was just swimming in deception and lies and the want to take advantage of others.
Besides, Arataka didn’t do friends. There was no one who really wanted to be friends with him at his school, so he didn’t try to reach out. No one wanted to build a connection, there was no need to build one. No one could really get past Arataka’s hand motions anyways, but that was fine. It just meant that he could weed out what people wanted from him faster.
He sighed, stretching his hands over his head as his shoulder bag nearly hit him in the head.
Okay.
Okay.
Maybe Arataka was a little down. Just a little, tiny bit, teensy-weensy bit down. Just the slightest bit.
He brought his arms down and kicked at a pebble along the sidewalk.
It wasn’t like this was going to be a long period of down-ness. He wouldn’t let it be, Arataka had way too much to do to be down! Like. . . . like going to the shelter and looking at the kittens and making sure that they were okay! And making food with his mom at home! And-and studying for classes too! Even though Arataka never really needed to study for tests and quizzes, as everyone panicked around him. Arataka was always able to keep his cool, it was really important for him to keep his cool. Otherwise–
Well.
Arataka was just amazing okay? He could keep his cool, even when everyone else was panicking around him for a silly ol’ test or quiz. But not Reigen Arataka! He’s just so cool like that, able of keeping calm even in the most dire of circumstances, like getting the milk later at night for his mom, or making sure that he got the last cream sandwich from the cafeteria while it was lunch rush time. Reigen Arataka was the coolest of cats, he could keep calm whenever and wherever something happened, because that was just something that was a constant in his life.
Takoyaki is the best food, mom would make her coffee in the morning, Hanazawa Teruki would be on television, and Reigen Arataka was someone who remained calm at all times.
Well, there was another constant in Arataka’s life. But that wasn’t something that he went around and just said to people. Not when he had so much to do with his life. He was a busy person, and he was a– a calm person too.
So when someone grabbed him out of the blue and wouldn’t say anything to him other than he needed to “meet with the master,” Arataka kept his cool. As he was tugged into a sketchy building and led down an even sketchier staircase, Arataka started reciting his katas for the shaolin kung fu that Mom had made him go to. He should start going back, he really should, especially if he’s getting dragged into shady places like this and his heartrate is spiking and his palms are getting sweaty and–
Oh.
Oh hell.
If mom was here she’d probably smack Arataka upside the head, even if he didn’t speak that swear aloud. But he felt it was justly deserved as he stared at the place, the sea of people he was being dragged into.
Y’see, just a little fact about Reigen Arataka, was that he had a minor psychic ability. It wasn’t amazing or anything, but it was his and he liked it. It was a weak power, it wasn’t something that could wow people, and it wasn’t something that he could use on television like Hanazawa Teruki could. It was weak, which meant that Arataka was weak, but that was fine. Psychic powers were just another part of humans, just like being smelly or being better at academics or athletics. There were other people with better powers, and Arataka just got the weak one, so others could look strong.
His psychic ability wasn’t amazing or powerful or awe-inspiring or grandiose.
It wasn’t any of those things.
It was just empathy.
That’s what he and his mom had come up with one night, when Arataka had cried about being different from his mom and trying to understand his powers. But he had been eight then, so it was fine for him to cry then. Back to his empathy powers.
Arataka could see people’s emotions, and if he was touching people, he could maybe give them a little boost of happiness. Maybe he could make someone upset or make someone hate another person or make someone sad, but he would never do anything like that. Just like hands and feet, psychic powers are a part of Reigen Arataka, which meant that he had to be careful with them. Psychic powers weren’t supposed to be used to hurt others after all, just like his hands, feet, or his words.
And right now, his empathy was telling Arataka that everyone in this room was the same, bright, cheerful yellow, with a green tinge on the edges. Happy. The same bright, smiling faces hidden by masks were probably grinning at each other, at Arataka, at the alter. It made his head swim, it made him sick to his stomach. The joy about humans, about so many people, was the fact that they were different. They had different feelings, they felt feelings differently, they felt the same feeling at a different intensity.
There was no way that everyone in this room was feeling the same exact emotion (happy) at the same exact intensity (bright blinding yellow with that same damn green tinge on the edges–) at the same exact time.
Someone in this room had to be, surely had to be, upset at the proximity, at the fact that there was this number of people in the room. With this number of people in the room, surely there has to be an introvert or two in the room!?
But no, there was nothing but happy, happy, happy yellow-y sunshiney happiness and that splash of blue–
Blue.
Arataka latched onto the blue that had some pink and some purple.
It was another psychic? Another esper? Whatever, it just meant that Arataka wasn’t alone in this horrible, mind-numbing yellow sea. He pulled himself free from the hold of the person who was still holding his arm and tried to make his way through the crowd to the blue-pink-purple aura. He had to elbow a few people, but even as he elbowed them in places he knew would cause bruises, would hurt someone even for a brief period of time– the yellow with a green tinge auras didn’t change.
It was scary.
Finally, after struggling through the crowd, he managed to latch onto the sleeve of the man, the esper, and used it to pull himself closer. Closer to the safety of the blue-purple-pink, closer to the safety of someone not having that creepy, creepy grin mask. Closer to someone who probably was just as confused as him.
The man looked down at him, face unchanging for a slight widening of his eyes, but his emotions said, they told Arataka that he was surprised. He was the most normal looking guy that Arataka had ever seen, his hair cut into a bowl-cut and his face inexpressive. He wore a dark coat with a lighter grey turtleneck and some black dress pants. He could blend in with the crowd and just disappear, if it wasn’t for the aura that Arataka could see and the sheer intensity of his emotions.
Arataka knew emotions. Usually they were like flashes of water in a hot pan. There one second and gone, although a lot of people hung onto the grey-lavender of grief or the burgundy-black of hatred.
This guy’s emotions certainly weren’t a flash of water in a hot pan. They were like a waterfall. Continuously falling into each other and with no end in sight, tumultuous and powerful and strong. Nothing like Arataka had ever felt before, but he had never met another esper before.
Even though the man was shocked, he wasn’t upset. Arataka still let go of his sleeve.
“Sorry, it’s just,” He motioned to the room. His hands continued to wave as he tried to think about what to say. “Everyone is wearing that same creepy grin mask, but you aren’t, and it’s, sorry.”
“It’s alright.” The man said slowly. His emotions didn’t say otherwise, so Arataka let himself stay near the man as the lights dimmed and the crowd, which had been chattering amongst themselves, fell silent. Arataka could feel it in his bones, something was about to happen. A show was about to be performed.
He felt himself shift closer to the safety of the blue-pink-purple, but his eyes were glued to the stage where the lights were shining.
Arataka was always a sucker for a good show.
The man who had the blue-pink-purple aura didn’t miss Arataka shifting closer however, and shock raced through his emotions like ice-cold-blue, and Arataka took a glance up at him before the curtains pulled back and stole his attention again.
Someone who was dressed in what looked like robes from a damn cult shop and another mask strut out, and with a single word, made the entire crowd laugh. Arataka flinched, the noise was loud and it pressed around him, the yellow-sunshiney-happy auras with a tinge of green flaring bright and assaulting his eyes. He groaned, his hands coming up and slamming on his ears to try and cut the noise down.
“They’re all the same.” He whispered, shifting in place. “They’re all, it’s wrong. People aren’t supposed to be all the same.”
“Are you okay?” The man beside him asked, his hand hovering. Like he didn’t know how to help Arataka.
“I’ll be fine.” Arataka grit out, eyes back on the stage as the man silenced the laugher with a mere word. It was scary. Squinting his eyes and looking closer, Arataka noticed that the man, “Master Dimple,” was it? had the same green aura that was the green tinge around the yellow-sunshiney-happy auras. Odd. If he was the leader of this place, shouldn’t he have the same yellow-sunshiney-happy aura as everyone else?
Another word and everyone’s masks were coming off and yeah. Arataka’s guess was right on the yen, everyone had a creep grin on. The only person who had a shred more color was the guy on stage, because he actually had those bright red splotches on his cheeks that the masks were probably supposed to be emulating.
Creepy. This entire place screamed of those documentaries that his mom watched when she thought Arataka wasn’t awake. A cult, Arataka had managed, somehow, to get dragged to a cult meeting.
Reigen Yoshiko was going to whoop his butt when got home. If he got home from this.
“Now!”
Oh no. He was gonna point at the guy and Arataka, wasn’t he? The sheer amount of chintzy grandiose that Arataka had seen on television warned him what was going to happen before it was–
“Who are our new converts?”
And yup. Finger pointed, creepy eyes on Arataka and the guy beside him. That was totally chintzy and Arataka wanted to just yell at the guy for how stupid he was being.
“I found him on his way home!” A woman from the crowd yelled. “He said that he was fine, but look at his face!”
Oh, she was the one who grabbed the guy.
Arataka looked up at the guy. He may have looked a little plain, but he didn’t have any bags under his eyes. He looked a little thin, maybe a little pale, but he was a grown man and he appeared healthy enough. Maybe Arataka should take him home to Mom, she would probably feed him.
“And the other?”
“Master Dimple’s” voice was annoying, Arataka wasn’t going to take him home to mom for a free meal. Mom would probably chase Master Dimple out with the broom.
“I brought him! He looked so sad!” A more masculine voice called, and hey!
Reigen Arataka was way too busy to be down!
“I’m not sad.” Arataka muttered under his breath. The man looked down at him, eyebrows raised as if he was asking a question, and Arataka could feel his peony-pink-curiosity rising, but it wasn’t important.
What was important was the man’s storm cloud-grey-unease was rising with each interaction that Master Dimple had with the crowd. Speaking of the creepy man, he was staring at both the guy and Arataka with a sharp glare, and he snapped his fingers.
“Fear not, my new converts!” His smile was more like a sneer, and Arataka watched the green-mildew-superiority flow into the neon green tinge. “Soon, we shall make you laugh as well, and you will be free from those pesky, unwanted feelings of unhappiness in no time!”
Okay. Arataka did not like what those guys were holding, but he hated what this guy was saying too.
“Those emotions are important!”
Silence.
Oh no. He said that out loud, didn’t he?
Well, if he opened his big mouth, he might as well go all out. It was just like when the debate club captain tried to debate him so he would join the club. He would talk circles around this guy and confuse him and everything would fine. It would be. It had to be.
“Emotions like that, sadness and grief, they’re important.” Arataka continued, feeling his spine grow straighter as he stepped forward. His hands immediately started moving, calming Arataka’s nerves more and making him more confident in his points. “Without the sadness and grief, we’re not capable of experiencing happiness, experiencing love properly.”
“But I suppose someone who’s like you wouldn’t understand something like that, would you?” Arataka shrugged, his hands theatrically facing the ceiling in a what-can-you-do motion.
“What did you just say?” Master Dimple asked in a somber tone. It almost sounded like a threat, and there were cinnamon-red-anger streaks in his aura now. But that could just be because Arataka insulted him, adults never really liked that. But too bad for Master Dimple, Arataka had already decided he wasn’t gonna let him go without a little insulting.
“Well it’s obvious isn’t it?” Arataka sighed, his motions made more exaggerated by the second. “You’re not someone who actually feels happy, so you built an entire cult on that premise. Kinda sad man, especially when you consider the fact that you can make your entire following laugh with a single word,” (which was really creepy, and Arataka’s not even going to MENTION the creepy same aura thing) “so I really think you missed your calling as a comedian.”
Master Dimple stared at Arataka.
Arataka stared at Master Dimple.
Behind him, the guy with the blue-pink-purple aura snorted all of the sudden, apparently finding something amusing.
“You are the worst kind of brat.”
Master Dimple wasn’t smiling anymore, he wasn’t leering, he wasn’t smirking. Cinnamon-red-anger was taking most of his aura, the neon green barely seen now. Uh oh, looks like Arataka hit a button he shouldn’t have. Should he backpedal? Try to appeal? Try to make the guy laugh since he seemed to value that so much? Maybe he should try and make a break for the stair–
A smile forced its way onto Master Dimple’s face, and it was the worst kind of smile. Arataka wouldn’t have needed his empathy to see through that façade. He very quickly physically backpedaled, finding himself right back at the blue-pink-purple aura guy’s side. This time, the man placed a gentle hand on Arataka’s shoulder when he stumbled, but took it away when he got his footing.
Nice gesture.
Blue-pink-purple aura guy was a good person.
“But despite you being that sort of brat, I can still help you. We all can, can’t we dear friends?”
The cheers of the people surrounding them was so loud. Arataka’s hands clamped on his ears again, the racket was horrible, worse than a basketball game at his school and they were forced to attend. The noise was overwhelming.
“With just one use of our smile masks, you’ll be feeling right as ra– ahem. You’ll be feeling like you’re on cloud nine!” Master Dimple’s leer was back, and with a twitch of his fingers, Arataka and the guy were separated.
“No!” Arataka yelled as he was gripped tight on his upper arms. He couldn’t get out of the grip, and that mask looked more like a sack that someone’s head was stuffed into before they were beaten to death on one of his mom’s shows. “No! I said no! Don’t you guys know the meaning of consent here!? I said no!”
The sack-mask was coming closer, and Arataka saw it.
The yellow-sunshiney-happiness with the green tinge was infused in the mask. The other guy was already wearing his, not putting up so much of a fuss, but Arataka was stubborn, and he wouldn’t go down without a fight. He would keep fighting until he was on the floor and squished by all these people and he had no air left to scream.
“I said NO!”
Arataka did something he never did. Something he had vowed to never do. Something he had promised his mom that he would never do.
He used his empathy in a way that didn’t uplift someone and didn’t help someone.
His own emotions lashed out, his own wheat-beige-disgust flashing outwards and racing into the yellow-sunshiney-happiness, burrowing underneath it. The hands retracted and Arataka fell to the floor, missing falling into the mask by like a hair and instead faceplanted onto the floor. Ugh, gross. When was the last time they cleaned this?
Trembling on the floor, he allowed himself to simply breathe for a second, just for a simple second. He had broken his promise, and he would have to grovel in front of his mom for that mistake, but he would do it. It meant Arataka got to go home at the end of the day, and he got to go home as himself.
Hands finding pressure under his shoulders, and he pushed himself up onto his knees, and managed to at least get one leg under himself before he looked up and over at Master Dimple.
Master Dimple, who looked about one burst blood vessel away from an aneurysm. Had Arataka shocked him that much?
“Bring another smile mask! And make sure to hold him more tightly.” Master Dimple ordered, rather coldly, and that didn’t sound good in the slightest. Arataka didn’t wanna keep using his empathy like this, like he had to protect himself. He would do it, if it meant he would get home and get to taste the hotpot that his Mom was making for tonight, and would he really get practice like this aga–
The other guy pulled his smile mask off with ease, looking at Master Dimple with a bland look.
“You shouldn’t be forcing others to do things.”
Arataka was pretty sure that every jaw in that room dropped to the floor, his included.
The guy stood, smile mask in hand. He stared down at in contemplation.
“I didn’t understand it at first.” He muttered, but it was loud in the quiet room, despite the number of bodies. “But it’s what you meant, isn’t it? All of them are the same. And that’s because you stole their emotions and just made them smile.”
Arataka felt his shoulders relax. The adult in the room understood. Everything would be fine now.
The man turned to Master Dimple. “You have powers, don’t you? But you’re definitely not an esper. I would have felt that,” Arataka wondered if this guy could feel his power like he felt the blue-pink-purple aura, but that was a question for later, “so you have to be a spirit. And not a particularly kind one, if you’re committing such heinous acts.”
Most people would think that red was rage. It was a common misconception, especially with how emotions felt. Red was rage, yellow was happiness, blue was sadness, green was envy, yadda yadda yadda. Serious misconception with the rage color. People lost control with rage and said that they felt a “red mist descend” upon their vision. Made sense, if their blood pressure was raised, but it didn’t mean that red was the color of rage.
Rage was the color of biohazard orange.
Arataka had only seen it a few times in his life; when Mom got calls from his stupid father, when some adults were yelling at each other, when someone in the school bought the last thing someone else was gonna buy. They were all soft biohazard oranges though, not permeating the entirety of an aura. Just barely touching the outer edges of an aura.
The guy’s hair started to lift. The blue-pink-purple aura was still there, close to the skin. But what else was left of that aura that Arataka saw of the guy?
Biohazard orange. More than he’s ever seen in his life. Absolutely permeating his aura. How does one human being have that much rage? But also–
Arataka knew the guy wasn’t completely gone. His actual aura was still at his skin. So this was maybe just an offshoot of his powers? Was this what an actual esper was like, using their emotions to fuel their powers so they could fight? Was Arataka watching an actual esper at work now?
Master Dimple’s face was showing his anger now, and cinnamon-red-anger streaked his aura before the green-mildew-superiority took over it, and the man’s face contorted like a damn person at the circus and there was this whole. . . . . it wasn’t a light show, but gas show sounded too bad to say to think. A little too wrong, but it is what it was. And something climbed OUT of the GUYS FACE!
Arataka scrambled to his feet, flinging himself at biohazard-orange-rage, knowing there was blue-pink-purple underneath it. So he was safe with the guy. The man caught him, and it was a surface feeling of ice-blue-cold-shock passing over the biohazard orange, before he was placed on the floor. Arataka slid around the man, his grip clasping tight to the jacket and peeking around the man to watch what was happening.
Scared as he may be about what was going on, he did enjoy a damn good show.
It was only as the gas show was finishing up that Arataka noticed that the yellow-sunshiney-happiness was floating. They were floating. The people were floating on the ceiling. Just how much power did this guy have?
“Are you actually upset? Don’t tell me you have some actual emotions!” Master Dimple sneered, and ugh. The guy was as green as his aura, which Arataka supposed made sense, but the form the guy chose was kinda weird. He still had those bright red patches on his cheeks too. Everything else was green, but not those patches. Weirdo.
“If you want to make me feel something, then try to attack me.” The man said, his voice laced with the rage that his aura was full of. “It would be a hell of a lot easier than trying to make me laugh.”
And then things happened so quickly that Arataka couldn’t really keep up with it.
Master Dimple was attacking, but hit something and bounced back, missing two limbs. The guy he was clinging to had a hand extended, his face still blank, but Arataka could see his aura. The biohazard-orange-rage was strong.
Banter was exchanged, and then Dimple was under the guy’s foot.
“These are my emotions.” He said, still in that rage-laced voice. “You wanted them? Here they are. Can you handle the extent of them?”
More attacks from Dimple. All deflected by whatever the guy was doing.
“You some kind of monster!?” Dimple asked, before launching off another attack that blinded Arataka.
Purple-heather-regret laced through the biohazard-orange-rage.
Dimple was right in front of them as the guy lifted a hand and placed two fingers between Dimple’s eyes.
“I’m terrible.”
Throughout the entire fight, short-lived as it was, the guy had gone for limbs. Now he simply parted Dimple in two. As if it was that easy. Arataka watched, just to make sure that Dimple, it, whatever it was, didn’t come back.
Biohazard-orange-rage faded from the aura, blue-pink-purple overtaking it as people were placed gently on the floor. Arataka watched as all the yellow-sunshiney-happiness auras popped, almost like bubbles. One by one, people snapped out of whatever trance Dimple had managed to put them under, and deep-gray-confusion overtook the room.
But it wasn’t like the yellow-sunshiney-happiness. The ice-blue-cold-shock was all at varying levels. Some of it was nearly white, some of it was nearly black. All of it, all the people, were varying shades of ice-blue-cold-shock, and Arataka let out a breath that he had been holding. He had really been scared that Dimple would have some lingering effects with keeping everyone on the same level of emotions, but it looked like it wasn’t the case.
Thank goodness.
If Arataka saw that yellow-sunshiney-happiness at that intensity again, he was gonna barf. Even if those emotions were genuine, he would barf.
“Ano,” The man said, and Arataka realized that he was still holding onto the guy’s coat with a really strong hold.
“AH! Sorry!” Arataka quickly let go, and tried to back away from the guy in case he wanted some space. Unfortunately, this meant that Arataka was backing away too quickly to look where the rubble from the fight had appeared in his path. Rubble that was not there earlier today when he had been on the floor before the fight had happened appeared under his foot and made him trip. Arms pinwheeling outwards, Arataka yelped, knowing he was going to hit his head.
Sorry Mom, looks like I’m not getting home unscathed toda–
HUH?
He wasn’t hitting the ground?
Arataka cracked open an eye, he hadn’t even realized he had closed his eyes in the first place– and found himself floating. He was engulfed in blue-pink-purple, floating above the floor a safe distance away so he wouldn’t hit his head.
He blinked.
“Ah! Sorry!” The man floundered, his face finally breaking from the blank mask and his emotions showed purple-heather-regret singing through his aura, even though his hand was steady as he held Arataka steady. “I just, you were going to hit your head, and I didn’t want you to get hurt, I’m so sor–”
“This is so cool!”
The man looked at Arataka, the ice-blue-cold-shock taking over the purple-heather-regret.
“I can’t do anything like this.” Arataka moved his arms, wondering if the guy would allow him to try like he was swimming in air while he was holding Arataka up. “I didn’t even know other espers! So it’s really nice to meet you Mister! Especially since you saved everyone. I’m Reigen! Reigen Arataka!”
He would have bowed at the guy, but y’know. Currently in the middle of the air.
Ice-blue-cold-shock was now in the man’s aura, replacing the purple-heather-regret. Good, the man shouldn’t regret doing something that helped others, using his esper powers to help people. Arataka was glad that someone else was using their esper powers to help people.
He gently placed Arataka on his feet.
“I’m. . . . . Kageyama. Kageyama Shigeo.”
“Nice to meet you Kageyama-san!” The blue-pink-purple aura faded from Arataka, and he was immediately bouncing up to the guy. He was glad that he finally had a name, he was tired of calling Kageyama-san “the guy,” or “the guy with the aura,” or “the esper” in his head. He opened his mouth to ask a question, right as someone opened their mouth behind him.
“Hey, what’s going on? How did I get here?”
Uh oh.
He and Kageyama-san exchanged wide-eyed glances, and the two of them immediately began beelining to the stairs and ran out of the building that had housed the cult that the spirit(?) had created. Kageyama-san had to stop running very quickly though, bending over at the waist and gasping for breath. Arataka waited for him, gripping his schoolbag tightly.
Kageyama-san finally caught his breath, and leaned against the building they were beside.
“Do you need some water, Kageyama-san?” Arataka asked, looking around for a konbini that he could spend the last of his yen in. It wouldn’t matter, Kageyama-san had just saved everyone in that room, so he really deserved that water if he wanted some. Or maybe ice cream? Arataka could buy the guy ice cream.
“No, I’m fine.” The man huffed. “Just, anemic.”
Arataka nodded, even though he didn’t know what that meant.
Then Kageyama-san’s aura changed from his placid blue-pink-purple colors, and then ocean-blue-concern.
“Reigen-kun, are you alright?”
Maybe it was the fact that Arataka had finally stopped moving and wasn’t guarding himself as much as he usually was. Maybe it was the fact that it was Kageyama-san, who he knew was a powerful esper, and he had never met someone like that before. Maybe it was the fact that they had just run, and Arataka always felt a little more honest after a run. Maybe it was the fact that his mind was replaying everything that had just happened in the past thirty minutes, and his mind wasn’t happy with playing happy now that he’d seen what happened when it was forced on someone.
“I–”
Maybe it was the fact that Kageyama-san’s aura was now a mixture of ocean-blue-concern and snow-white-gentleness.
“I–!”
His lips trembled, and his face felt hot.
“I don’t know?”
A few tears tried to drip down Arataka’s face, and he scrubbed at them with his gakuran sleeve. He couldn’t cry in front of Kageyama-san! He was too cool! Arataka couldn’t be not cool and cry in front of him! That would be like, the uncoolest thing to do, especially since Kageyama-san just took down an entire cult and the cult’s leader!
Kageyama-san’s hand was on his shoulder, not applying much pressure. Like he didn’t really know what to do.
“Do you, ah, do you want some tea?”
Arataka sniffled, scrubbing at the corner of his eyes with the wrist of his gakuran. Tea sounded really good, and Kageyama-san was a good guy, so he nodded. Kageyama-san looked surprised, but he led Arataka along with a hand to his shoulder, and Arataka fell in step with the man, gripping his schoolbag to his chest. They walked in silence, although Kageyama-san’s aura was still ocean-blue-concern and snow-white-gentle, so it spoke enough for the two of them.
It was an office building that Kageyama-san led him to, and they climbed up some stairs and Arataka looked up at the door.
Kageyama Brothers: Spiritual Consultants was the sign that hung up on the door, before Kageyama-san opened it.
It was a nice little office, if a little cold-feeling. Not in the temperature way, but the way that only an office could feel. Like these brothers only treated the office as an office, the job as a job, and not a livelihood, not something that they enjoyed doing. Cold in the way that there weren’t many positive emotions in the room.
Arataka frowned to himself at that thought. Wouldn’t brothers like each other? At least spread some positive emotions into the room, at least where the desks were? Then again, as he thought about his own sister who sided with his deadbeat father, it wasn’t always the case that siblings liked each other.
“Do you want some honey in your tea?” Kageyama-san asked, his voice making Arataka jump, and he realized the man was in a kitchen alcove that he hadn’t seen before. Thankfully, the man’s back was to him, so he didn’t embarrass himself even more in front of the guy.
“If you don’t mind, I like honey.” He muttered, deciding he could be allowed to sit on the couch, and placed his schoolbag on the floor. “I’m sorry for crying in front of you.”
“That’s not your fault. Dimple seemed to be a higher level spirit, so the fight was a rather scary one, and I’m certain I didn’t help in that regard.” Kageyama-san deflected, the water boiling and being poured into a cup.
“Dimple wasn’t really that scary.” Arataka frowned at his lap. “Neither were you.”
Kageyama-san stopped moving in the kitchen. Arataka gathered his thoughts together while the tea brewed.
“I think, what I was scared of the most, were the auras in the room, what Dimple could do. What he was capable of. That’s what scared me.”
The clinking of a spoon against ceramic stopped, and he could feel Kageyama-san staring at him. He brought the tea over, handing Arataka a mug and keeping one for himself. Arataka simply held it, leaning back in the cushion behind him as he waited for the tea to cool and the man to ask his questions.
Just as Kageyama-san opened his mouth to ask, the door behind Arataka opened.
“I’m ba– Nii-san? And ah, who’s this?”
Arataka turned around, looking. This must be the other Kageyama-san, he looked like the other one. With spikier hair. And his aura was kinda the same too, just more blue-purple than pink. He waved at the man, tea still in hand.
“Hi. I’m Reigen Arataka. Your brother and I got abducted by a cult.”
A blink. Two. Three.
Lemon-yellow-exasperation clouded the aura as the other Kageyama-san slammed a hand to his forehead. “Nii-san? Really?”
Kageyama-san sighed as he tried the tea. “I promise, I wasn’t trying to find this one Ritsu. I just got dragged into the meeting, and it was the same for Reigen-kun.”
Arataka nodded, before he snapped around to look at Kageyama-san.
“This one!? Kageyama-san, how many do you cults do you break up? How many are controlled by spirits?”
“Surprisingly, very few. Most are run by people who think that someone who looks like me is easy to manipulate.”
“Wait, you can see spirits?” The other Kageyama-san asked, walking around to sit by his brother. He peered at Arataka, his frown growing by the second. “You don’t have an aura, so can you just see energy?”
Arataka felt his cheeks flush with color as he looked away and sipped his tea that Kageyama-san made for him. It was sweet, almost too sweet, but that just meant that Kageyama-san was listening when Arataka said that he liked honey.
“It’s not the strongest esper power.” Arataka muttered into his cup. “And my own aura gives me a headache, so I try to keep it under my skin.”
The two brothers looked at him with eyes wide like owls, ice-cold-blue-shock in both their auras. Kageyama-san almost dropped his mug, if the other hadn’t caught it with the telekinesis, which was still so cool to see in person! Seeing Hanazawa Teruki do it on television just wasn’t the same as seeing it in person!
“Reigen-kun, do you think you could stand it just for a little bit to show it to us?” Kageyama-san asked, taking his mug back from his brother’s powers.
Arataka frowned and sipped his tea with a huff. He really hated his own aura. But Kageyama-san was asking! But his own aura was really goofy looking. But Kageyama-san was asking!
He placed the mug down on the table between them. “Fiiiinneee. But no laughing.”
Squinting at the two of them, both nodded at him, Kageyama-san looking a lot more serious than his brother.
Closing his eyes, Arataka let his shoulders drop and felt around under his skin with his energy. It felt like one of those little dials that some people had installed for their lights. Currently, Arataka had it dialed back to a zero, so he just carefully turned the dial up. A gasp from one of the brothers in front of him, and he knew if he opened his eyes, his aura would be flowing around him like he was the center of a whirlpool.
Opening his eyes, he stared down at his hands, now coated in rose gold, periwinkle, and sunset purple. He lifted one up, and wiggled those fingers at the brothers, who had ice-cold-blue-shock streaking through their auras with green-sea-wonder starting to permeate Kageyama-san’s. The other Kageyama leaned closer, letting his aura poke out and press against Arataka’s. It felt weird, but Arataka let it happen, besides, he could feel the ice-cold-blue-shock and peony-pink-curiosity for himself like they were his own emotions. Huh, almost like when he touched someone with the attempt to boost their mood, but in reverse, neat.
Spiky Kageyama tilted his head, squinting his eyes. “Huh, you don’t have telekinesis.”
“Nope!” Arataka said as cheerfully as he could manage. “And I can’t do that thing that Kageyama-san could against the spirit Dimple that stopped him from touching us.”
Kageyama-san stared at him, ocean-blue-concern starting to seep in.
“You can’t create a barrier?”
“Is that’s what it’s called?” Arataka asked, deciding to poke back at Spiky Kageyama, making him blink in confusion. As if he hadn’t expected Arataka to be able to do that. “No, can’t do that at all! The most I have is my aura, but y’know.” He shrugged. “Headache. So I don’t let it out.”
Spiky Kageyama retracted his aura, eyes studying Arataka. He seemed to be contemplating something, something that needed a lot of thought.
“So you can’t create a barrier or use telekinesis. What is your power? Invisibility?”
Arataka felt a grin starting to creep up his face.
“Why don’t we make it a game?”
Now Spiky Kageyama was leaning back, dusty-rose-trepidation starting to streak through, while Kageyama-san now had the peony-pink-curiosity. “A game, Reigen-kun?”
“Twenty questions! You ask, and I’ll say yes or no.” Arataka picked his tea back up. “I bet you can’t guess it though! I’m really incredible and you won’t be able to because it’s so cool. Not even my mom knew wh–” Arataka stopped cold, feeling his face drain of color. “Oh no.”
His eyes searched for the clock in this office. “Oh no.”
“Reigen-kun?”
“My mom is going to kill me. I should have been home ten minutes ago!”
Reigen Arataka was dead. He would die and wouldn’t be able to talk to these cool espers anymore. Such a horribly small existence and he couldn’t even talk about it properly! He wouldn’t be alive to properly tell them his esper powers that weren’t really powerful but were still his.
“You can use our phone.” Kageyama-san offered, gesturing to the landline that was on the desk in front of the windows. Man, today really had blessed Arataka by letting him meet Kageyama-san today, hadn’t it? What kami had decided to bless Arataka today?
Immediately he sprung up and shot over to the phone, punching in his mom’s home phone number. Jiggling his foot, he shifted back and forth as he waited for her to pick up. When she did, she tried to start with their normal spiel of being an old lady who didn’t understand how a phone worked, but he could hear the hidden upset and fear in her voice that was from him not showing up on time.
“Mom, it’s me.”
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
[“Arataka, where are you?”]
Oh crap, no nickname. She was really upset.
“I’m at the Kageyama Brothers offices. I uh,” He shifted back and forth, his aura surging with his guilt like ocean waves. “I kinda got pulled into a cult meeting?”
Silence on the other end of the phone.
“I’m okay! I swear I’m okay!” He was quick to add. “Kageyama-san was there, and he’s a really cool esper Mom! He took care of everything. But I guess I was kind of shaken up? So he brought me to the offices and I just realized the time and I’m so sorry and I would have called earlier I promise–” his free hand started waving quickly. (Behind his back, Ritsu raised his eyebrows at his brother, and Shigeo just shrugged. It just seemed like it was a quirk of Reigen-kun’s.) “–but I totally forgot in the excitement and I’m really sorry and–”
[“Taka-kun, breathe.”] His mom sounded more amused now. Thank goodness. [“I’ve found their office address online, they’re spiritual consultants?”]
“Yup! That’s them!” Arataka let his shoulders fall from their place around his ears. “You’re coming to pick me up?”
[“Of course I am. Stay there please.”]
“Yes! See you soon!” Arataka waited for the dial tone, and then placed the receiver down gently. Killing him wasn’t out of the question yet, but that was only because Dimple wasn’t here to be killed. Since Kageyama-san had already taken care of the spirit and all. He turned around and walked back to the couch, sitting down and bouncing on the cushion. “Sorry about that.”
“It’s not a problem. We’d like you to be safe.” Kageyama-san, mint-green-sincerity in his aura as he sat back in his own seat, while Spiky Kageyama nodded. No mint-green-sincerity, but it wasn’t needed really. Arataka still felt safe with the two of them.
“Now, back to the twenty questions!”
“I know it has something to do with auras.” Kageyama-san said, sipping his tea, then frowning slightly at his tea. Sky-blue-disappointment fizzled in his aura, the reason that Arataka could see when the man placed the mug down was that he had drank all his tea already. “You mentioned that you were scared of what Dimple was capable of with those auras.”
Arataka nodded, because it was all true. Empathy did have to do with auras, and he had been scared of what Dimple had done because of those auras.
Spiky Kageyama tilted his head and narrowed his eyes.
“And you weren’t scared of me when I went to one hundred percent rage.” Kageyama-san said quietly. Spiky Kageyama snapped his head to look at him, mouth dropping as ice-blue-cold-shock nearly took over the entire aura.
“Why would I be?” Arataka asked, sipping his tea that was growing cold. “You still had your aura, which meant that you had control. So there was no reason to be scared of you.”
Ice-cold-blue-shock was taking over both their auras, nearly blocking out the blue-pink-purple. They stared at Arataka, like he had just stated that the sky was brown or something.
“You both are shocked, was it something I said?” Arataka asked, giving them a little hint.
“It’s– it’s nothing.” Spiky Kageyama whispered. “Uh, you, what else can you do?”
Arataka dialed down his aura, finally hitting his limit on seeing his own aura. He hid it beneath his skin again, and sky-blue-disappointment danced into Kageyama-san’s aura. Did he like seeing Arataka’s aura? But no one like it except his mom.
He placed a finger to his chin, wondering how he could play them. “Well, I can give people a boost.”
Of emotions. He thought cheekily, and sat back to watch the Kageyama brothers obviously try to figure out what his powers were. This was fun!
“So you’re an amplifier?” Spiky Kageyama asked, his eyes sharp as he looked Arataka up and down.
“Nope! Not an amplifier!” Well, maybe he could be. That could be fun to try one day. If he still got to hang out with these cool espers. Could amplifying emotions make another esper’s powers stronger! That would be so much fun to try out!
“You just said–!” Spiky Kageyama looked ready to combust, and Arataka snorted into his tea at the sight, trying to keep his cackles to a quiet level.
“You said everyone was the same in that cult.” Kageyama-san, looking upwards. Sunset-red-thoughtfulness was permeating the blue-pink-purple aura. “It overwhelmed you.”
Kageyama-san was definitely on the right track. So Arataka just sipped his tea and watched as Spiky Kageyama tried to parse out his clue(s) from earlier and as Kageyama-san tried to think through what had happened down in cult’s room.
A knock on the door made everyone flinch, and Arataka turned around. That wasn’t his mom’s pink sunset and golden aura, it was a woman though.
“Ano, I’m so sorry to bother you.” She whispered, messing with the strap of her purse. Teal-unease and heather-exhaustion streaked through her aura, giving her an unbalanced look. “I just saw the sign and wondered if you two would be able to help me? If you’re busy, I could leave. . . .”
Arataka’s eyes slid back to the brothers.
Both radiated with gray-stone-determination. That was the signal that Arataka needed, and he jumped to his feet, smile grinning at the woman and pressing butter-yellow-calm into the aura beneath his skin, hand extended to the woman.
“We can definitely help you ma’am! These two are the best after all! Would you like some tea? You look like someone who would like some mint tea.”
She blinked, deep-gray-confusion overtaking her for a second before she took his hand. The butter-yellow-calm washed into her aura, and her shoulders dropped faster than a stone in a river.
“Oh, mint tea sounds lovely.”
“I’ll go make some for you while they listen to you!” Arataka led her to the couch and let her get settled before bouncing over to the small kitchen and searching for the teas. Easy to spot since Kageyama-san had just made some tea, and Arataka flipped the switch for the electric kettle and listened in on why the woman had come to the two brother’s office for help.
It seemed that she had a problem with feeling watched, and with no one else living beside her or above her, the only solution was a spirit of some sort haunting her. Frowning, Arataka waited for the switch to flip on the kettle and poured the hot water over the tea leaves. Usually, someone would at least attempt to go to the police before spiritual consultants, so obviously she had already gone there.
And had probably been laughed out of their offices.
He glared at the tea while it brewed, before shaking his head and slapping his cheeks with his hands. He shouldn’t be getting all wrapped up in a stranger’s concerns. That wouldn’t do, it wouldn’t help him in the end. But, he was here, and could listen to her. And she had gotten to the point of teal-unease. That meant it was really bad, Arataka only really saw that during exam time at school.
Scrounging around the kitchen just a little more, he brought the tea back to the office area, handing it to the woman with a gentle smile. Watching her take a sip, her teal-unease and heather-exhaustion melted into peacock-content for a second. The touch of honey was a good guess then, he had thought that she was the type with a sweeter tooth. Task successfully completed, he darted behind the couch that the brothers were sitting on, leaning on one of the free spaces on the end as he continued to listen to the woman continue to tell her story.
“It’s definitely worrying.” Spiky Kageyama said, making a few notes in a little notebook that must have been in a pocket. “Would you like both of us to be there? Or just one?”
The woman tapped her mug with a fingernail, her sunset-red-thoughtfulness looking nearly pink.
“I wouldn’t mind both of you coming to see.” She said, now relaxing into the seat. “But if you believe only one person is needed, then that’s fine too. Just, someone believing me is enough.” She let out a soft laugh. “No one else would.”
Blood-orange-self-deprecation started to creep into her aura, and tears started to line the bottoms of her eyes. Neon-yellow-panic lanced through both of Kageyama’s auras. Did they not know how to handle a crying woman? A crying client? Whatever, Arataka could do this!
“We believe you!”
He leaned with both hands on the back of the couch, practically a hair away from tipping over and onto the couch as he looked at the woman, pushing royal-purple-earnest into his aura and his expression. She looked at him, ice-blue-cold-shock lancing through her aura.
“We believe you ma’am.” He repeated. “And we want to help you.”
Fuchsia-thankfulness burst into her aura, encompassing all other colors that had tried to take hold, and the tears dripped down her face, but he knew that they were ones of gratefulness. So he pushed himself off of his perch and darted over to the other desk and grabbed the tissue box and held it out to the woman.
“Thank you.” She whispered while she dabbed at her face. “You don’t know what that means to me. You really don’t know.”
Arataka smiled brightly, not saying a word to confirm or deny such a thing, and let her and Spiky Kageyama talk out more details when she had calmed down enough to do so. Out the door she went, and Arataka placed the tissues back down where they belonged. The brothers should really think about getting a box for the table in front of the client’s couch, but that was just his opinion.
“It’s emotions, isn’t it?”
Arataka turned to look at Kageyama-san, who was looking at him with warm, dark eyes.
“Your esper power. It’s emotions, isn’t it?” He repeated part of his question, hands folded in his lap and his aura its neutral blue-pink-purple, which meant that he was completely calm. Spiky Kageyama opened his mouth to say something, closed it, seemed to think, before giving Arataka an outrageous look.
“Yup!” Arataka laced his hands behind his back. “I see emotions around people like an aura, and can sometimes influence other’s emotions when I touch them.”
“You little shit!” Spiky Kageyama stood to his feet. “You said that you give people a boost, you didn’t say it was an emotional boost!”
His aura was partially ice-blue-cold-shock and sunset-yellow-playful as he lunged for Arataka, and Arataka shrieked in laughter as he dodged, barely avoiding the couch and got nearly immediately lifted with a twitch of Spiky Kageyama’s fingers.
“Ritsu, that’s not fair. He doesn’t have telekinesis.” Kageyama-san sighed.
“His game was rigged! I’m allowed to cheat too!” Spiky Kageyama shot back, and with another flick of his wrist, Arataka was spinning upside down. He laughed at the sensation, not unlike when his mother would spin him around when he was child.
“Ahem.”
Pink sunset and gold told Arataka just who it was at the doorway, and he grinned cheekily at Spiky Kageyama and stuck out his tongue.
“Mom help! My limbs are being misplaced! Soon there’ll be nothing left!” He wailed dramatically, floundering his limbs this way and that in the esper’s hold, and said esper’s jaw dropped before he was turning to his mom and dropping into a bow.
“Ma’am I quite assure you that’s not what’s happening–”
“Don’t worry, I know my kid.” He heard his mom sigh, and a giggle escaped him as he tried to right himself in the weightless hold. A twitch of Spiky Kageyama’s fingers, and he was upright and back on the ground, and rude. He liked being weightless.
“Taka-kun, what’s this I heard about a cult?” She cupped his cheeks and turned his head this way and that, ocean-blue-concern on the edges of her aura. The levity in the room had been sucked out of the room at that reminder, and Arataka sighed.
“I–”
“Your son and I both were snatched by recruiters on the street, probably mere minutes after each other.” Kageyama-san broke in. “He was actually one of the biggest reasons that I knew something was as wrong as it was.”
Here, he sent Arataka what looked like an almost. . . . . fond look? Huh?
“Your son has quite the gift for reading the room.” He started out, folding his hands in his lap as he stared at Arataka’s mother. Gray-stone-determination was radiating from him, and Spiky Kageyama slid to sit beside him, also having gray-stone-determination on the edges of his blue-purple aura.
Arataka squinted at the two of them.
What are you up to?
“Yes, he does.” Mom said, her tone somewhat guarded. She didn’t like when esper talk was brought up, mostly because they had never met another esper before. But maybe she would be okay talking about his esper power, weak as it was, with more espers?
“They already know what it is.” Arataka told his mom, her eyes darting to him for a second. “Kageyama-san, uh, the not spiky one, guessed just a few minutes ago.”
“The what!?” Spiky Kageyama asked in a thunderous tone. Kageyama-san turned his head, his hand covering his mouth, but his aura didn’t lie. Bubblegum-pink-amusement laced through it, and Arataka felt proud of getting such a strong reaction out of the stoic man.
Mom coughed too, the bubblegum-pink-amusement a little weaker than Kageyama-san’s, but her eyes were twinkling. “Well, that means you know what Taka-kun is capable of? So reading the room is literally something that he is best at.”
Kageyama-san nodded, a little solemn.
“We’d like to hire him as a secretary.”
What.
What.
“What?” He asked out loud. “Seriously?”
Kageyama-san nodded, blue-pink-purple aura with stone-gray-determination not wavering in the slightest. Spiky Kageyama was the same way, despite the way that he rolled his eyes and grumbled under his breath.
“The way that you took care of the client told us everything that we need to know. You can be an empath and still hate dealing with people,” which, somedays it was like that for Arataka, but they didn’t need to know that– “and it was clear with how you handled Yamazaki-san that you like dealing with people. Thrive in it, really. People who come here are often frazzled and can’t really articulate what’s wrong. But you calmed her down with such ease and earnestness. Like you were born for it. So yeah, we want to offer you a secretary position.”
Arataka would like that.
He would really like that. Spending time with two powerful espers and learning how to do business with them? That was like, his dream come true! He would absolutely take this job, it didn’t matter how much they paid him, or how little. Hell, he’d take a salary of three hundred yen if it meant that he could work here! And those little yen could add up and then he could buy his lunches and stuff and then Mom wouldn’t have to scrounge for money for him.
Eyes snapping to his mom, he could see her wavering on whether she would allow him to do it.
“Mom.”
Her eyes looked at his. They likely saw all his want and determination to work here. They both knew that if she didn’t give the okay, then he would just come here and hang out after school. That was something he was willing to do and they both knew it.
She closed her eyes, and Arataka felt red-hot-triumph glow through him. He immediately darted over to lean on the couch like he had been before.
They both knew he had won, but they also knew that Reigen Yoshiko was going to make the men in front of him prove themselves and why he should work here when she didn’t know them at all. She crossed to the other couch that he had been sitting in initially, sat down on the middle cushion and crossed her legs at the knee.
“Tell me why you think you should be allowed to hire my son.”
Kageyama-san immediately launched into a monotonous list, and looking at the ice-blue-cold-shock in Spiky Kageyama’s aura, this might as well be a passionate speech for the man.
And Arataka? He just leaned on the couch and let his eyes close. The words washed over him, and he knew, he just knew this was going to be the absolute best thing that had ever happened to him.