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rkin413 · 1 year

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I’ve been working on some fluff, and one of them finally turned out okay! Have some Naeishi parenting. (No readmore bc it’s short)

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It was dark. Very dark, and very cold. Her pretty dress was all torn up, and tears leaked from her eyes as she sniffed, and the noise, despite being quiet, attracted the attention of the thing in the dark. More and more pairs of eyes lit up and focused on her, and she was forced to flee as it chased her, her bare feet making smacking noises on the cold floor and attracting more and more unwanted attention. She turned back to look, not stopping, but that was a mistake and she tripped over something hidden in the darkness. She flipped over onto her back and tried to crawl away, but her body wouldn’t move fast enough, and it closed in-

A light shove to the chest snapped her awake, panting and tears stinging in her eyes. Sachiko yelped at the sight of eyes in the dark, jerking back and almost smacking her head into the wall, before her eyes adjusted to the dark and she saw who it was.

“Noriko! Don’t scare me like that!” Noriko didn’t move, just pursed her lips and huffed. “…okay, yeah, thank you for waking me up.” Noriko nodded, lips twitching upward slightly, before she fully frowned again and climbed into Sachiko’s bunk.

“Nori?” Sachiko asked in confusion, before her twin’s arms wrapped around her and pulled her into a hug. After half a second, Sachiko returned the gesture, crying even as the few solid details of her nightmare became blurry and vague.

About two minutes later after she cried herself out, Sachiko pulled herself out of the hug, rubbing her stinging eyes as she nodded at her sister. “Thank you, Noriko. Again.” Noriko nodded again, turned her head towards the door, then nodded her head towards it. Sachiko nodded at her. “Yes please.”

….………………………………………………………………………………………

Neither of the men in the apartment were conscious enough to hear the pitter-patter of tiny feet approaching, but the door opening did snap the two of them awake.

“Girls?” Makoto asked, trying and mostly failing to blink the blurriness out of his eyes. “What are you doing up at…” he glanced at the clock. He couldn’t quite identify the numbers so he took an educated guess. “Three fourteen AM?”

“...I had a bad dream,” Sachiko admitted, looking at the floor. Her voice was trembling slightly, like she was going to start crying. “It was dark, and something was chasing me, a-and…”

“It’s okay, Sachiko!” Taka assured her, getting out of bed somehow -Makoto admired his willpower- and kneeling in front of her. “You’re okay, right? You didn’t hurt yourself while asleep, did you?”

“No,” Sachiko answered. “Nori woke me up before I could have.”

Taka beamed proudly at his oldest daughter for a second before focusing on the one in front of him again, stroking her hair to try and comfort her. “Then there’s no problem! It was just a dream, and those can be very frightening, but nothing inside them can truly hurt you!” Sachiko nodded and hugged him.

“Do you two want to sleep in here tonight?” Makoto offered. Sachiko, face still buried in her papa’s chest, hummed an agreement, and Noriko nodded at Makoto.

“Alright, then!” Taka declared, scooping up Sachiko and, after shifting her slightly to hold her in one arm, took Noriko’s hand as he returned to bed.

….…………………………………………………………………………………

It was a rare occasion that Makoto woke up before Taka, but today was one of those rare days. Unfortunately, just because he’d woken up first didn’t mean he’d be getting up first. He let out a fond sigh at the feeling of Taka’s strong, protective arms tightly wrapped around him, smiling and nuzzling his neck slightly. Taka let out a sleepy breath, but there was no sign he was about to wake up. Makoto knew from experience that trying to wiggle out of Taka’s arms was pointless, and resigned himself to his future as a literal prisoner of love.

Okay, that line was a little cheesy, even for him. Forgetting that.

He tried to shift slightly, and only then realized that there was a second pair of arms wrapped around one of his legs. With some effort he lifted his head, and while he couldn’t quite make much out, the mess of brown hair told him exactly who had his leg in a deathgrip.

So Sachiko is a sleep cuddler like Taka, Makoto mused with a smile. I didn’t know that could be hereditary.

At that point Noriko rolled in her sleep, smushing one of her feet against his cheek, and he had to suppress a groan. Perfect.

#Danganronpa #Taka Lives AU #one of them anyway #Makoto Naegi #Kiyotaka Ishimaru #Sachiko Ishimaru #Noriko Ishimaru #Naeishi #the ship isn't the point exactly but it's there #in which i abuse commas #i actually have a bunch of older drabbles for this ship but uhhhh i never managed to finish them whoops #this is A Way to introduce my fankids i guess

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sweetfirebird · 2 years

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All Talk and a Big Nose

@felixjoyful kindly donated and asked for something about Nadir! Nadir! the precious!!

However, since I have not read the book in uh... since it came out so like 4 years? I had to do some refresher skim reading and I might have missed a few details. (Like how to spell Laviias? ha)

Anyway, this is the "written in a day" version of the scene I have thought of for the sequel that I really need like.. to win the lottery even a little so I can take the time to write it.

Warnings: mention of past torture, mention of past summary executions, brief mention of a shitty family, spoilers for Taji From Beyond the Rings, Sha culture's ableist attitudes

All Talk and a Big Nose (which is a terrible title but my brain is dead)

Nadir was not technically back on any kind of duty, but he was in his blacks, and he was walking alongside the others. Lin had held helped him dress, holding out a short formal coat she must have taken from one of the others, since Nadir’s formal coat had been destroyed or taken from him or merely ruined after his capture.

He’d never liked it anyway. The IPTC version of flash was a stiff coat covered in patches to honor events Nadir either barely remembered or didn’t want to. Lin would have dressed him in that if she’d had it, and was after more patches for him from the sound of it. She and Trenne had sent off the records of what had taken place at Laviias and then in the capital afterward. Both of them had reported Nadir’s actions in terms Nadir had glared at Lin for, if not quite daring to glare at Trenne.

The reports would possibly net Nadir the tiniest raise and maybe a promotion, if he stayed on active duty.

Which he wasn’t thinking about, because potentially career-ending injuries were for when a career was much farther along, and really ought to happen closer to planets or hubs with real medical equipment and staff—if reports were filed to convince IPTC to pay for more than the minimum repair or replacements, decisions about which could take forever even when not out here on the far side of the known universe.

Knowing that IPTC would be slow to act was probably why both Trenne and Lin, as the now-ranking officers here, had filed what they had as early as they had; they knew they needed to argue to the I.P.T.C. that Nadir was worth the investment of the care and not just a bonus packet in his ‘retirement’ file.

In the meantime, Nadir could hobble along until Nev cleared him for any sort of duty while waiting for the decision. Then maybe contest it, maybe not.

Nadir was facing retirement early, and in the meantime, his team was down another member in a situation that only seemed more stable than before because Nadir hadn’t been out of bed to view the capital for himself.

It was a good thing Nadir was used to stuffing down panic until he could ignore it and IPTC bullshit wasn’t anything new.

He’d had no plan when he’d joined up with them, except to get away, see things. The same as most, he imagined. Very few joined with something like the I.P.T.C. looking for adventure or a chance to stomp some heads, and those that did tended to burn out or die early on.

Not much lost there.

The rest got trained and shipped around. Investment was what the Mouth called it—back when the Mouth had been in his right mind and available to talk to, which he currently was not, and Nadir wished him well in that. Trenne deserved the break, if it was one, and the Mouth was a good catch for anyone with a taste for danger. Nadir would have made a play for that himself, back in the early days, if it hadn’t been obvious to everyone that Taji had stars in his eyes for Trenne.

Trenne was slightly less obvious, except to Nadir, who knew him pretty well, and maybe to Lin, who had probably spotted the Sha version of adoration long before the rest of them, whatever that was.

Nadir thought of them Trenne and Taji with a small, inward sigh, but also some trepidation. The team was essentially down Trenne as well, for the foreseeable future, and their translator. For a sacred honeymoon fuckfest that apparently half the Sha would kill for.

Fucking was nice, and Trenne was considerate and good at it, but the shehzha thing wasn’t about that. Not really. Not according to what Taji had said… and what else Nadir could remember of whispers in the dark.

But life or death situations fucked with people, and Nadir’s memory from Laviias onward was full of holes. Thankfully, IPTC might heal his body but had no interest in his mind as long the body was functional and he did as he was told.

If they did step in, it would require Nadir going off-planet for a while. Maybe for a long time. They might send replacements for the team.

He should take comfort in that, but anxiety had settled under his skin after he’d woken from his nap in the pre-C bed and he hadn’t been able to banish it. He didn’t want to. Anxiety could be useful, save a life, if not his because he was usually ignoring it for one fool reason or another.

They weren’t family. They were teammates. They were roommates, of a fashion. But thinking of them as family was dangerous. The Mouth would have something to say about that, about pack bonds and humans and connections, probably furiously yelling about how Nadir had nearly died for them and been happy to do it. How they had come back for him.

They had come back for Taji, Nadir would point out should Taji ever say such a thing. But he thought, deep down, that if they had expected to find him there, they would have searched for him too as his actual family would never have done. The moment Nadir had been well enough, Nev had punched his arm. That said more than Nadir wanted to deal with now with so much else to think about.

He almost preferred the pain and the exhaustion already making his limbs heavy. Tight-lipped and furious, Nev had tried to fill him up with the most protein-dense Sha foods available that morning and Nadir really should have thought about why. He was tired and they hadn’t even made it through the final arch in this endless hallway of high arching doorways leading deeper and deeper inside the Koel estate in the capital.

The estate and all the buildings on it were very old, according to Taji’s notes, which Nadir had read out of boredom during his constant days of rest—necessary constant days of rest, it turned out—and not at all in the style of the last estate of a Sha noble Nadir had been in.

He was unexpectedly grateful for that difference.

And it meant something to be escorted into the deeper spaces of someone’s home. He’d gathered that even without scrolling through Taji’s haphazard notation system.

Taji had been overworked, that was obvious. His work for Tsomyal had been one thing, his gathering information for the next group of IPTC types to come here another, and then he had taken it upon himself to correct and amend the preliminary translation work his predecessors had done.

Which was very Mouth of him, but Nadir could admit, having had a translation device in his ear feeding him chunks of stiltedly translated ‘Sha, that the original translations had missed a lot.

Right now, for example, his translation device wasn’t telling him much, and his limited ‘Sha wasn’t helping. But whatever it was that the servants had said to themselves after watching Nadir disembark from the flier using the walking stick—barely disguised crutch—that Rodian had carved for him, he knew it wasn’t flattering.

This was not a culture that liked to see such things, such people, in public. Something they had all noticed on days when Taji’s limp had been more pronounced, but it was another thing to experience. Already a human outsider from a feared and disliked entity and now this.

It might have been why, one of the reasons why, Trenne, downstairs gathering food and getting reports from Lin, had asked if Nadir was truly intent on going with the ambassador and their guard today.

Of course, Trenne would know about the whispers and stares. He received lots of them in his time here.

Nadir had grown up with them, just been for different reasons.

Tsomyal had merely regarded Nadir for several moments, then said, “There will be no place to sit except a cushion on the ground, and then not unless the emperor is seated. That’s not a law but it may as well be.”

And at those words, for no reason at all, Nadir had had to stuff down panic again. He’d given Tsomyal a grin and a wink. Tsomyal had given him no reaction whatsoever.

Lin had not been, and still was not, amused by Nadir’s decision to be here today. But she hadn’t tried to talk Nadir out of coming along as part of Tsomyal’s protection detail despite him not being back on duty. She also had not come to see him last night thinking Nadir was intent on proving himself to his former captors the way that Nev had.

Lin seemed to know more than the others, enough to say, “Taji shehzha is for emperors. We are not.”

Nadir had kept his smile in place, but only just.

“Some things have to be confronted quickly,” he had answered after a while, meeting her eye to say it. Then banished, he’d added silently. Like dreams.

Dreams were healthy and good and fine, but they had to be acknowledged as dreams alone.

Thinking like that kept him alive.

Of course, it also meant Nadir had no idea what sort of life he would lead without IPTC, but that was an anxious thought he could have when he was back in bed, out of pain meds and unable to sleep.

He made himself look around at the artwork that went all along the walls and all the way up to the ceiling, some looping like calligraphy, others showing vivid scenes in styles that must have changed over a vast span of time.

Above were what he thought of as skylights, letting in violet light that made the art seem to glow. The colors in the art had probably been chosen for that effect.

The others had been to this estate before, or part of it. Not this part, Nadir guessed, since Tsomyal was also glancing at the walls and the other decorations with interest.

The greenery—so to speak, since none of it was green—the home, or palace, had been built around was lovely but to be expected. It was the architecture and the skill of the artwork, commissioned over centuries, that was there to be admired.

This part of the estate meant to be shown off, he supposed. The Koel had been emperors before.

Nadir hadn’t looked up more than that. Partly because he suspected he didn’t need to hear more tales of Shavian political violence, and partly because Taji’s notes on the subject were largely recordings made during some Shavian political violence, and Nadir definitely didn’t want to hear the worry and fear in the Mouth’s voice.

He should probably also stop thinking of Taji as the Mouth since the ‘Sha word kahne was sort of derogatory, but it was also what he was, and was proud of being. Taji had a way of saying it, or had had, during Nadir’s last short visits with him. Taji shehzha, as a title of honor and blessings.

Shehzha, someone cared for and tended to. Shehzha to be loved after a lonely, pain-filled life.

And when that—the longing, his translation device would say stiffly and possibly incorrectly—wore off, Taji would still have Trenne. There wasn’t even a betting pool on it. It was a fact everyone had recognized long before the Mouth had.

Must be nice. Must also be the kind of thing that had to stay a dream.

That was for people like Taji, just as Lin had said.

Nadir faced forward and raised his chin like he was waiting for an inspection and focused on walking straight and upright. Swagger would have been too much to try with the stick. A grin, though, he could manage that. Shavians wouldn’t know what it meant, but he would. He even winked at one of the tall, gray-clad Imperial Guard members who stopped them beneath one of the arches.

This guard might have been one of those to escort Nadir to his questioning. This Guard might have been friends with some of the Guards Nadir had killed. His heart beat faster at just the sight of the gray uniform but he had no idea if they held his actions against him or considered his duty comparable to theirs. It was as though any of them had spoken to him before, or during, any of the things they’d done.

He gripped the head of the walking stick harder, willing for his hand to be sore later when the rest of him would be anyway.

He could admit, after reading Lin, Trenne, and Rodian’s report of events, that he was a little confused by the behavior of the Imperial Guard, and how they were meant to be trusted now, by anyone. Taji’s report would have the answer, but it would be some time before Taji could make it.

Nadir made himself stare at the nondescript gray fabric worn by the next Guard, then raised his head.

This Guard had no response to his wink, not that the Sha knew what winks meant, either, unless they had their version of Taji Ameyo somewhere to tell them.

Nadir turned his focus elsewhere without any relief from the tension in his shoulders. The pain was nothing, everything, familiar and everywhere, dulled only slightly by meds. Nerves were the danger. Fear blocked sense. He inhaled and looked around for threats he couldn’t possibly deal with as he was.

The Guards hid their weapons, so he assumed they had some on them, just like most everyone in the room they entered, including Nadir himself. The members of the team had taken to wearing the knives in their gear the way the Shavians did… and also carrying quite a few more of them, sometimes hidden, sometimes not; Nadir wasn’t the only one having sleepless nights.

He kept to his space slightly behind and to the left of Tsomyal—not in guard position, not outright behind her as Taji might have done—and wished that he scanned the room the way Markita and the others were doing. But his attention went to the tall—tall, even by the standards of giants—dark figure in a midnight blue soria with embellishments or paint or embroidery that looked identical to some of the artwork they had just passed.

He didn’t know if that meant something. Everything was a message as far as Taji’s notes were concerned, but Nadir was barely more than a mercenary. He could tell what piercing placement meant for flirtations on several planets and what the make and model of Rodian’s favorite long guns said about him. But political messaging was Tsomyal’s area, with Taji’s assistance.

And with no Mouth, they would have to make do, and guess like their lives depended on it.

Because they did.

Nadir assumed the simple yet dramatic soria with possibly a link to the history lining the walls leading to this room was some sort of reminder. The notes on the Koel were maybe something Nadir should have forced himself to deal with. The family was old. Larin—the Sha did not speak his name now, but Nadir would do as he fucking pleased with his memories of Larin—had executed some of them.

Larin had been about messaging too, when he’d had Nadir in his throne room or whatever he called it. A message to the I.P.T.C., and a message to the others around him. A stupid message, as far as the I.P.T.C. was concerned, since they wouldn’t care about Nadir’s life in any personal way and would likely just use what had happened as justification to do as they pleased.

As for the others… Nadir couldn’t remember any faces or names, which he thought of as a lucky break. All he had let himself think of at the time, when he could think, was keeping his mouth shut and wondering if Sha nobles were supposed to scream when questioned, or if that was somehow shameful.

Sometimes, Nadir had let himself think of something else. That was one thing dreams were good for.

But that was a blur too, indistinct and better that way. Words that slipped away the second he woke up. Fragments of stories that made no sense but made his heart pound.

It was why he was here, even though he could barely stand and he would be stuck in bed for days to recover from just this.

The tall figure, their dark soria startling when surrounded by so many in much more colorful choices, was barefoot, ears forward to listen intently to whatever the one next to them said.

There was really nothing about the Shavian setup to indicate who was emperor. No throne or silly hat or fancier dress to give it away. Only the deference shown them and the number of Imperial Guards nearby. That, and the fact that everyone was forced to visit the Koel estate if they wished to see or consult their emperor.

There did not seem to be too many Sha elite there today. Nadir didn’t know the reason for that, didn’t particularly care. He had no desire to look into their faces and wonder which ones had been present for his questioning or which ones had spoken calmly as it happened. He didn’t know their fates, and honestly, if he had, he wasn’t sure what he would do. He wouldn’t endanger his team. So ignorance was best, whatever the Mouth would say about it.

In that respect, Nadir and the Imperial Guard had something in common, a thought to make him smile again and toss another wink at the Guard nearest the emperor.

Nearly as stone-faced as Trenne, the Guard didn’t even twitch an ear.

That happened only when the Guard escorting them moved swiftly ahead and spoke softly, too softly for human ears, to presumably both that Guard and the emperor, and the Guard returned full attention—a bit sharply, Nadir thought, back to Tsomyal and the IPTC guards around them.

Markita clucked his tongue, then flicked his fingers in an “Easy” gesture, meant to calm Nadir, as if a room full of the Guards who had tortured him and the people who had watched were enough to send Nadir running.

The sound Markita made had been quiet—to human ears. To Shavian ears, to one particular set of ears tipped with silky looking black fur, the unfamiliar sound must have been loud as a shout.

Talfa Emperor turned their head to track the noise, dark eyes landing instantly and correctly on Markita as the source.

That gaze, interested, sparkling, not unfriendly, far more revealing than any of the Guards’ around the emperor, then moved to Tsomyal.

Nadir leaned hard on the handle of his walking stick, knowing he was ashen and sweaty, too aware of the weakness in his legs and how he was going to have to rest soon, and what the Sha would think of that.

He directed his grin elsewhere, sideways, toward Markita, who wouldn’t see it now that he had to keep his eyes on all the threats in the room, of which there were many, then to Lin, who startled him by looking back, impassive and Sha.

Nadir took is as a question, and dropped his smile before giving her a small nod. He had done what he’d come here to do. The rest was just bearing it, like anything else.

He looked back to the emperor.

Talfa Emperor.

Who had at least taken the feet of the last emperor. Which was symbolic and meant to shame Larin’s memory, according to Taji. Nadir supposed he ought to find some pleasure in that.

Koel Talfa. A lover of tales and, usually, brighter colors. That was really all Nadir knew of them.

A stranger, if one who had once said things that teased Nadir’s memory as he woke up and who, according to others, had been to see Nadir as he’d slept in that fucking coffin bed, but not since.

Because this was not a tale and Nadir was no Taji shehzha. He was a soldier of a disliked foreign force, and now, weak enough to show it through the use of a crutch. And, if Nadir were honest, not at all the starry-eyed gift to a bed that someone like the Mouth would be. He was all talk and a big nose. A mid-sized cock the Sha would hardly notice. And no skills outside of doing what had to be done.

This was why he’d joined the others today, and he was glad.

He even raised his head to offer the room another grin.

At the movement, the emperor turned.

Their eyes widened.

“Saya,” Talfa exhaled, sweet and surprised.

Nadir’s heart was pounding.

#gays in space #taji from beyond the rings #nadir needs a tag #that scene with nadir that i would love to do #one of them anyway #all talk and a big nose #nadir btw is absolutely as unreliable as taji

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