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phantomrose96 · 7 years

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A Breach of Trust Chapter 15.5: A Beach of Trust

(Act 1: Chapter 1-9 )

(Act 2: Chapter 10 || Chapter 11 || Chapter 12 || Chapter 13 || Chapter 14 || Chapter 15 || Chapter 15.5 || Chapter 16 || Chapter 17 || Chapter 18)

(Act 3 Chapter 19+)

There is one universal law of anime, and it is that there is always a beach episode. There is always a beach episode

Mob had fallen asleep beneath the couch blankets again, curled into the cocoon so that the blankets served double as his pillow. He was woken up sometime later by the sound and brightness that came with Reigen swishing back the curtains.

“Wake up, Mob. We’ve got plans.”

Mob opened his eyes. Reigen stood over him, wearing swim trunks, a white tank top, and enormous sunglasses with the price tag still dangling off the right ear hook. He had globbed suntan lotion on his nose and shoulders, and he thrust a mesh bag to Mob containing roughly the same outfit but in a smaller size—sunglasses and all.

“I’m overworked and you’re traumatized. I don’t know anything about mental health but there’s no way a day at the beach can be bad. So get changed it’s beach time.”

Reigen sat down on the couch beside Mob, one foot pulled up and resting on the other knee, and he pulled out an assortment of deflated floaties from his own bag. He uncapped the mouthpiece of one—a duck by the looks of it—and started to inflate it.

Mob stared, baffled. “…Beach time?”

…

“Look, I’m just saying that if you’re gonna be using up your vacation days sitting home, we may as well use the vacation days.”

Jun tossed Tetsuo’s swim trunks onto his head. He put his controller down and grabbed it off his face, looking first in confusion at the swimsuit, then at Jun, who stood in front of the couch in a red bikini. She supported a beachbag by its strap, with a sunhat beneath her arm and sunglasses tucked into the string of her bikini top.

“Are we going—you mean the beach…?”

“I already invited Isa. She’s probably there already. Get moving, Tetsuo.”

“…The beach though?” He held the trunks out, baffled. “It’s October!”

“Alright fine. You can stay here. Isa and I will go and just gossip about you.”

Jun turned on her heel, flipflops slapping as she headed to the door.

Tetsuo bounced from the couch. “Wait! No wait, I wanna gossip too!”

…

“This is…what, exactly?”

“Intermission.” Teruki did not look at Ritsu. He faced the icecream vender. “Two please.”

Ritsu watched him take the two cones in his hand, coated in rainbow sprinkles, but somehow the bright mess of every color decorating the icecream cones still paled in comparison to Teruki. His swim trunks were neon green, dashed with oranges, purples, and reds. His unbuttoned shirt was a piercing salmon color, his two bright flipflops did not match, and his pink sunglasses glittered.

He still wore his tie, which he had not been able to get off.

“And when does intermission end?” Ritsu asked.

“When we’re rested up and ready to fight again. You can’t have me ruining my good looks with no rest. It’s bad for my skin.”

“So the fight’s still going?”

“Yes.”

“And we’re just…at the beach…in the meantime.”

“What? Would you rather go grocery shopping? Most people say thank you when they’re brought on vacation.”

Ritsu said nothing. He only walked behind Teruki, dumb-founded, as they headed for the waterfront. Ritsu’s own beach wear was tattered black trunks, an unbuttoned black t-shirt that seemed less “unbuttoned” and more “had the entire front of it violently torn off”—it was his school uniform, actually. It had just been properly shredded enough to double as beach wear.

Teruki stopped suddenly. He thrust his arm out, and the items in his bag spun out onto the sand. Two full-sized beach chairs unfolded and set themselves up, two immaculate pink towels, two umbrellas perhaps more garish than Teruki’s outfit, a cooler with soda, a platter of small sandwiches, a bottle of suntan lotion, a reflective tanning fan.

Teruki flopped onto one of the chairs, floated his icecream cones (both of which appeared to be for him) into the air, and grabbed the tanning board which he fanned around his face. Ritsu stared in utter discomfort at the tie still on his neck. He wasn’t sure how Teruki was breathing.

“Move, you’re blocking my sun.”

…

Tetsuo laid on his stomach, eyes shut, fingers swishing through the hot sand. Jun and Isa chatted quietly in the background. The steady roll and ebb of the waves rocked him to sleep—maybe he could sleep, maybe it was fine.

“Hey bro, can I borrow your sunscreen?”

Tetsuo’s eyes snapped open. A shadow bent down above him, blackened eyes, a noose around its neck, tattered green clothes that had seemingly rotted with the years. Tetsuo shrieked and shot back.

“Yeesh, you coulda just said no bro,” Mogami said. He stood up taller, looking left and right. “Now I’m gonna burn.”

Tetsuo only watched in abject horror as Mogami walked away, pulled a chair and an umbrella out of nothing, and set it up roughly five feet from Tetsuo’s own spot. Mogami waved at him, summoning a pair of sunglasses to his face and unbuttoning his shirt. Tetsuo stared back unblinkingly.

“Tetsuo, what?” Jun asked. She tapped him on the shoulder. Isa stood only a step behind her.

Tetsuo pointed, voice shaking. “Mogami.”

Jun followed the line of his finger, staring at the set-up beside them. She squinted. “…What, off in the distance?”

“Right—right there!”

Jun said nothing for a moment. “…Tetsuo, there’s nothing there.” She turned to Isa. “Right?”

Isa nodded. “Nothing’s there, Tetsuo.”

Tetsuo stared. Mogami blew him a kiss.

Tetsuo’s voice pitched into falsetto as he answered, “Yeah, alright, sure, okay.”

…

Reigen stood beside Mob in line for the beach rentals. He shielded his eyes with his hand despite wearing sunglasses on his head.

“Whatdya wanna get, Mob? Kickboard? Volleyball? Ooh, wonder if they rent sailboats. My dad taught me once how to control one.”

Mob threaded his fingers together, hair in a ponytail on his head that Reigen had sloppily tied up with a rubber band. He looked around at all the people he was distinctly not shredding.

“Um…” Mob answered.

“Yeesh, hey Mob look at that kid. That’s a fashion disaster.” Reigen pointed ahead of them. A boy in neon green shorts and a salmon shirt with mismatched flipflops and pink sunglasses stood in line ahead of them. “At least his emo friend has some fashion sense.”

Mob watched. The two boys rented a surfboard. The dark-haired boy grabbed it, and held it up in front of his face as he walked right past Mob. Mob watched him go.

Mob opened his mouth “He…he seems—“

“Surfboard! That’s the way to go.” Reigen slapped Mob on the back. “God I don’t know how to surf but I bet that’d be fun.”

…

“New plan.”

Teruki stood on the other side of the beach volleyball net. A swarm of mangled, howling spirits swept up behind him. Ritsu’s own decimated horde circled behind him.

Teruki grinned. “We decide this match with spirit horde beach volleyball, my horde versus yours.” Teruki held up Gimcrack. “This thing’s the ball.”

“Um…” Ritsu answered. He watched Teruki pull uncomfortably on his tie. “…Do the spirits know how to play volleyball?”

“Mine do.”

“Do mine?”

“I don’t know. I’m not responsible for your horde.”

“Why is Gimp the ball??”

Teruki tossed Gimcrack into the air. “First point! Let’s go!”

…

Reigen sprawled out on the one beach chair he’d brought, half-dozing in the sun. The parts of him not globbed with sunscreen had turned beet-red. He adjusted his tanning board a little more.

Mob sat down in the sand. He pointed. “Reigen, whose ball is that?”

Reigen lifted his sunglasses and squinted. He saw nothing on the ground where Mob pointed. He lowered the sunglasses. “I dunno.”

“I think it belongs to those volleyball players. I’m… I’m gonna go return it.”

“Have fun, Mob.” Reigen answered, eyes shut. He dozed off lightly for 30 seconds until the pattering of feet caught his attention.

Reigen opened his eyes again, disturbed, and squinted past the sun. The boy dressed all in black stood over him, panting.

“Did our ball roll over here?”

“Oh, yeah, the kid’s returning it.”

The boy, who in fact looked quite beat up, quirked an eyebrow. “…What kid?”

“The um…the kid I found, or something. He’s mine now I guess.” Reigen squinted harder at this boy. He looked familiar.

“Oh…um, alright,” the boy answered. He turned, headed back to the volleyball court. Some kinda faint magenta trail seeped out of him, staining the air he passed through. Reigen grunted, and shrugged, and shut his eyes again.

“…Who was that, Reigen?” Mob asked, 30 seconds later, once he returned.

“I dunno.”

…

“Bruh you know what’s so sissy? When people buy ‘light’ beers and try and bring them to a party. Is that your girlfriend’s beer, bro? That’s weak shit. I make my own microbrews. You can’t go back once you know good beers, bro,” Mogami said.

Tetsuo stared forward, rigidly, his every muscle tense. Quietly he mouthed to himself It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real.

Mogami reached over and took one of the beers from Tetsuo’s cooler. “I mean I don’t trust industry, you know? All that government-regulated crap? You should look into libertarianism, by the way, bro.” Mogami took a swig of the beer. “Yeah, that’s why I’m self-sufficient in these things, bro. I make my own food, I seek out my own flesh vessels to possess. None of that government-issued stuff. Free healthcare is hurting the economy, bro.”

Tetsuo was rocking back and forth now. Jun and Isa had gone back to chatting. The sun was starting to set. Mogami stole a sandwich from the cooler too.

“What’s your stance on religion, bro?”

…

Reigen folded up his chair and squeezed the air out of the floaties one by one. He shot a few sidelong glances to Mob, who stared transfixed at the two volleyball playing boys off in the distance—or, at least the boys standing on the volleyball court. Neither of them had a ball, or seemed to be playing. They just shouted a lot at the empty air around the court.

“I think one of them just won,” Mob remarked.

“Uh-huh,” Reigen answered absently. He stared at the elaborate beach chair set-up the two boys had put up. More specifically, he stared at the untouched platter of sandwiches in the center. “And they didn’t eat any of the food they brought.”

“Um.”

“Do you think they’ll notice if we snag a sandwich? Nah, right? There’s like 20 of them they won’t notice.”

Reigen put his stuff down and marched over to the sandwich platter. He grabbed the top one and inspected it.

“What are you doing, old man?”

The voice was behind Reigen instantly. He startled, and turned to see bad-fashion boy standing there with his hands on his cocked hips. Reigen looked back and forth between the boy and the volleyball field, mentally attempting to calculate how he had moved so quickly.

“Um.”

“Don’t fight with him!” Mob shouted, to the bad-fashion boy it seemed. “Reigen is a very powerful esper, and he didn’t mean it. We’re leaving.”

Bad-fashion boy quirked his eyebrow. “Oh, and I’m not?”

Mob stopped, blinked. “Oh… Oh, you are. I feel it now.”

Bad-fashion boy appraised Mob. “…Seems you are as well, but you can’t be stronger than me.” He stuck a hand out. “Teruki Hanazawa.”

“Oh, nice to meet you,” Mob answered, taking his hand.

“Now fight me,” Teruki said. He summoned a ball of yellow flame to his fist. “Hopefully you won’t be as disappointing as the other one.”

“Welp—none of that,” Reigen said, hoisting up Teruki by the scruff of his shirt. The yellow fire extinguished in Teruki’s palm. He kicked and flailed around, but he was shorter than Reigen, who easily held him off the ground like an angry kitten.

“Let me go!” Teruki insisted.

“No fighting with Mob. Where are your parents, kid?”

Teruki looked him dead in the eye. “I have no parents.”

Reigen stared back, then sighed, then tucked Teruki under his arm. “Well, I already adopted one kid. May as well make it two.”

“What?!”

“Come on Teruki, you’re heading back home with me and Mob. I’ll set you straight or…something. Mob, say hi to your new brother.”

Mob stared at Teruki, who was now snarling and attempting to snap at Reigen’s fingers. “But he’s—that’s not my brother. I want my little brother back, not this guy.”

“Mob, listen.” Reigen hoisted the beach bag over his free shoulder. “Who the heck knows where your little brother is? I mean you probably do but you won’t tell me. You have to settle for this kid.”

…

Ritsu looked up, and from a distance he saw some old man walking off with Teruki under his arm. Some kid in a ponytail walked beside him, his face covered by Teruki’s flailing body.

Ritsu stood there, Gimcrack in his arms, watching.

“Teruki?”

#A Breach of Trust #long post #a very serious addition for a very serious day #somewhere off in the distance there are several animated gemstones facing off #A tall angry red one doing battle with a half-shattered green one #No one notices

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