Chapter Text
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table
— T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
✤
Eito is smiling cheerful bright and he means it, which is the best part of it. He's a little clumsy with his happiness and a little bit vacant but he means it and that's what matters most. Takumi looks around, secretly, but Nozomi's brows are pulled tight together and Takemaru is scowling uncomfortably.
"It's alright guys," he reassures them all earnestly, "he's on our side now."
"Really?" Takemaru seems to be sizing Eito up, stepping closer as if to intimidate Eito, but Eito isn't to be intimidated in his present state. He wasn't to be intimidated before either but it's different now. Now he just stays there, placid and friendly, nothing mean or malicious or clever shining behind his eyes.
"I'm on your side now," Eito echoes him, somewhat flatly. "You're all my good friends and I will help you kill invaders in order to protect humanity."
"You don't hate humanity anymore, then?" Tsubasa scoots forward hesitantly, a little bit skeptically and she can't be blamed for her doubt. Takumi had doubts too, at first.
"I don't hate anyone," says Eito. "I don't know how."
"See?" Takumi steps in, in between Eito and Takemaru, making Takemaru take a couple of steps back. "It worked and he's good now. It's just like with Eva."
"It did work for Eva," Kako muses hesitantly. "She's our ally now at least…"
"I'd still stay away from him," Ima whispers to her with his hand pressed against his mouth, giving Eito furtive, suspicious glances. Ima is never helpful in situations like this.
Eito, throughout it all, stays smiling. Takumi told him to sit down at the table and so that's what he did and he hasn't moved from there. He's cooperative now. That's a good thing. He was unreliable before, untrustworthy, even when he was smiling — especially when he was smiling. Takumi couldn't trust anything he said even if he wanted to, and he did sometimes want to even though he knew he shouldn't. Now he's sincere and he means what he says and he's like how he was before, only better, because the Eito of before was a lie hiding hatred and there's no lies left to the Eito before him now. Takumi expunged all the lies and freed him from his hatred and it's the better now, for Takumi and for all of humanity and for Eito too. It's all much better.
He hadn't understood it when they took him in, when he was restrained to the foreboding chair in the dark and foreboding Infirmary room. He'd been mean and sharp with his tongue and he'd called Takumi all sorts of names and tried to talk his way out because he hadn't understood then that this would be better. He understands now, though. It's much better. He's much happier. Takumi wouldn't do this if he had other options anyways, but he doesn't, not really, so he had to and it's not his fault.
"You'll get used to him," Takumi tells them all. "You'll see that he's not going to betray us. Right, Eito?"
"Of course not," says Eito, beaming. "I cannot do that. I love you all," he adds, his head tilting slightly to one side. He blinks the way a doll blinks when you turn it over, too slow in opening his eyes again and his gaze too glassy for it to be natural. Takumi clears his throat and looks away.
"Does he still see us as monsters or whatever?" Gaku asks, tugging his cap down over his ears, looking all sorts of stressed over Eito's presence. Well, Takumi can't really blame him but he wishes he'd calm down a bit. Takumi looks over to Eito.
"I don't see any monsters," Eito replies. "All I see are my beautiful friends." It's a little much, a little cheesy, sort of embarrassing, but Eito was like that before, wasn't he? A little cheesy, kind of embarrassing but it was endearing too, though Takumi pretended it wasn't. It wasn't real then but it can be now. Everything is much better now.
✤
They all insist on Eito sleeping in the cage for longer. Until they're certain, at least. Takumi feels badly about it but Eito doesn't care. He calls it his cage as if it's something he owns and he and Eva are neighbors and they wave at each other before going into their respective prisons, their smile mirror image reflections of each other. It's a little unnerving but Takumi's glad they're getting along. Everyone's come around on Eva and so he's sure they'll come around to Eito too. If they knew what he was like before, how nice he was and good to have around, how much they all appreciated him and if they could feel the loss of him the way Takumi did then he's certain they'd all come around easier, that they'd see it all the way he sees it. But the future that exists now only in Takumi's past is his and his alone, a secret he can share but that no one else can understand.
Eito's like Eva in a lot of ways and it's a little bit too much like Eva for Takumi's liking, a little bit too blank and obliging. Sirei's happy it worked out like this and it's better than the other Eitos they tried. The first couple attempts didn't go very well. Takumi tries not to think about them. When he said that maybe they went a little bit far in adjusting him this time, the final time, Sirei had just told him in a jolly voice that better too far than not far enough with someone like Eito. You really can't be careful enough. And that's true enough so Takumi let it be and he figures he can fill out the empty places in this new blank Eito. He doesn't have to stay so blank forever. It's a temporary state.
"Goodnight, Takumi-kun," says Eito softly, his glasses shining like twin moons in the Courtyard light. He's sitting on his bed, hands folded in his lap.
"Yeah," Takumi swallows, watching with an odd feeling in his throat as Eito carefully takes one glove off after the other and then his jacket. Methodically he puts the gloves in the jacket pockets and then hangs the jacket on the corner of his bedframe. "See you tomorrow."
✤
Eito is sitting on the bed again next morning when Takumi comes to get him. Eva's already gone and now that he thinks about it he doesn't think they've been keeping her locked up any longer but he can't remember and the key is Shouma's responsibility and he doesn't care either way, really.
"Good morning, Takumi-kun." Eito greets him with a smile, standing up slowly. Takumi doesn't plan on saying good morning back but Eito looks at him so expectantly with eyes so big and guileless that the words come out of him without his input. "Are we going to get breakfast, Takumi-kun"
"Yeah. You're probably hungry, right?"
"Am I supposed to be hungry?" Eito steps out of the cage but only after Takumi holds the door open for him. He scratches the back of his neck as he lets the cage door slam shut.
"I mean, yeah, probably? It's been a while since you've eaten, right?" Eito seems to think about that for a second and then nods, as if he came to some sort of conclusion or made a decision.
"I'm hungry then, Takumi-kun." Takumi tries to ask him questions on the way, asking 'What do you want to eat?' and 'What foods do you like?' but Eito gives vague and unhelpful answers. Whatever Takumi-kun gives him is what he's hungry for. He doesn't have anything he wants but if Takumi-kun wants to pick out a favorite food for him, then Eito would want that.
Takumi never found out what food Eito likes best before. He never noticed, really, what Eito liked to eat. If he had a favorite food once, Takumi never knew it.
"Do you like sweet things?" he tries.
"Do you want me to like sweet things, Takumi-kun?" Eito responds.
"No, I– Ugh, forget it. Just eat whatever. Uh," he stops short. "Don't let Ima or Kako feed you anything." Eito nods, his expression very serious.
"Understood."
It's difficult managing this Eito who doesn't know anything about himself, who is too cooperative and too obliging sometimes, but that's better than the alternative. Takumi wants to sit by Nozomi but Kurara is there and she's unhappy about his presence and then infuriated by Eito's, because Eito, after getting his food at the Ration-O-Matic starts trailing after Takumi like an oversized lost puppy so he gives up on that and sits down at the other end of the table next to Yugamu, who has finished his meal but decides to linger, taking slow sips of a cup of coffee. He sits there with an elbow propped up on the table, heel of his palm supporting his chin as he studies Eito, a lazy, catlike smile stretching across his face.
"He really is quite a bit like our Eva-chan," he muses. Takumi's not the one being looked at but he feels like he's being sliced through with x-ray vision and he shifts in his seat, uncomfortable. "What a change you've made."
"Yeah," says Takumi, noncommittally.
"So obedient and well-behaved," Yugamu's smile widens, a predatory gleam in his eye. "I didn't think you had it in you, Sumino-kun. You don't seem the type."
"I don't think I want to know what type you thought I was."
"The cute type, for one," Yugamu tells him, predictably. Takumi rolls his eyes. "He's cuter than you are though," he adds, with a nod of his head towards Eito, who doesn't seem to hear him. Takumi tries not to feel put out by that. He doesn't really care who Yugamu thinks is cute. "He was so violent and hateful before… you can't help but find someone like that a little bit attractive, can't you?" He sighs deeply, longingly.
"I can," Takumi mutters, stabbing his eggs aggressively with his fork.
Yugamu reaches out to touch Eito's face, crooking his index finger under his chin and pushing it up; Eito obeys, his expression blank and calm. He'd never have allowed something like this before. It's strange to see him so cooperative, so obliging, so obedient. He would let any of them do anything to him like this now. Takumi stares at him, shocked and confused and doesn't know what to say or what to do.
"And now he's so docile," Yugamu coos. "It's such a terrible thing you've done to him, Sumino-kun— and yet it's very alluring too. I'm sure he'd let me do whatever I wanted to him like this, no matter how painful or depraved it was."
"Do you want me to do something?" Eito asks, sounding as though he doesn't really understand what it is Yugamu is saying.
"Stop being weird, Omokage," Takumi mutters. "He's not gonna help you with your… with whatever it is you like to do." Yugamu withdraws his hand, pouting slightly.
"Aw," he whines. "No fun."
✤
Eito often follows him like a shadow. He's quiet mostly which is odd because Eito does so love to talk. He'd talk for hours and hours about things Takumi didn't understand or had never really heard about before, about his books and the things he learned in them and he'd made it sound interesting too, like there was a whole secret world hidden between the pages of these dusty old library books. Even though he hated Takumi and even though he said every second with him was suffering, Eito talked to him even when he didn't have to.
He must have loved talking more than he hated Takumi, if such a thing was possible. But now Eito doesn't talk all that much, unless someone talks to him first. He doesn't do many things of his own volition unless someone tells him to do it first. He's like a ghost, a shade, an echo, a remnant of someone Takumi used to know but had never understood. The only thing he does do on his own is follow.
"Don't you have something else to do?" Takumi asks at last, after a good thirty minutes of trying and failing to have fun in the Rec Room while ignoring Eito's presence.
"No."
"Nothing? Don't you want to read a book or something? You could go to the Library."
"The Library?" Eito enquires thoughtfully. "Are you telling me to go there, Takumi-kun?"
"No, I'm not— I'm just saying you could. If you want to." It's still irritating talking to Eito even when all of the things that made him irritating are gone. He's got a talent for getting on Takumi's nerves or something. He's not trying though and he can't exactly help it, Takumi supposes, so he tries not to hold it against him too much. "You like reading," he tries again. "So I thought… you might wanna do some of that?"
"I do?" Eito looks down. "Okay." He says it like he's memorizing it or telling it to himself, not like he's agreeing.
"You do. You read so much and I don't understand it. I always thought books were boring."
"Are books boring? You said I liked it."
"They didn't sound boring when you talked about them, at least." Takumi throws his last dart and misses spectacularly. It wasn't a fun game anyway so he doesn't even care. "You made them sound fun and cool." Eito processes that.
"So they are not boring," he concludes eventually. It makes Takumi's chest feel funny and he doesn't like it, doesn't like the vacant confusion on Eito's face. It's a very innocent kind of confusion, the uncertainty of a child that doesn't know up or down in a world that's strange and unknown to it. They really took away a little bit too much of himself but it might not go well trying to put it back and it's painful to go messing with someone's head or at least it sounded and looked painful but Takumi doesn't know what it's like himself. Eito had made such dreadful sounds when the machine had been going.
"No," he tells Eito heavily. "Books aren't boring. Not for you."
✤
Takumi hadn't wanted anything to do with the Dolmenic Cognitive Reconstruction Therapy. He'd suggested it, to be sure, but that didn't mean he wanted to do it. He thought Sirei would whisk Eito away with his drones and he'd be gone from his cage from a day or two or maybe even three and then he'd be back all spiffy and shiny and devoid of hatred and it'd be good and Takumi wouldn't have to think about it much at all, just like he doesn't have to think about Eva much at all. But Sirei had summoned him into the Infirmary and told him how it all works and showed him the lever to pull and Takumi didn't know how to get out of it at that point and Eito was strapped down to the chair looking at him with cold steely eyes full of hatred and Takumi wasn't able to look away from him either. For some reason it was Eito and his eyes that steeled him, that trapped him.
The first time was awful and Takumi doesn't like to think of it. Doesn't like to think about any of it but that first one was the worst so it's the one he tries the hardest to scrub clean from his mind but it sticks around like dirt under the fingernails, grime in the caulking between the tiles, sticking in the difficult to reach corners and refusing to come out. Eito had just been screaming and screaming, angry first and full of violent furious rage, all entirely himself then. He'd been calm and even friendly until he'd figured what they were doing and that there was no sliding out of it and then he'd become angry and loud and said he hated Takumi about a dozen times along with a bunch of other unpleasant insults. Then he'd been in pain, after the lever was pulled, or at least it sounded so but Sirei said it was alright and Takumi wanted to think it was alright so he didn't let himself consider if the process involved pain. It didn't last long even though it felt like it lasted forever. Then there was quiet but that had only lasted a few seconds until Eito had, dazed, breathing hard, eyes wild and showing more white than color had raised his head and looked around and then he'd started again with the screaming and shouting but higher this time, thrashing against his restraints until his wrists were rubbed raw and red.
Takumi had told him to calm down and walked toward him with his arms up but that had only made it worse and worse and it made Takumi feel worse and there were marks on his wrists and his voice was harsh and his breath loud and ragged like it hurt to breathe.
Sirei had a tranquilizer though so that was over and done with quickly and then he was limp and quiet and the silence that came then felt like a great gaping maw, an abyss that opened up underneath Takumi's feet and threatened to swallow him whole.
"Well," Sirei sighed, rubbing the side of his round robot head. "That didn't go as I hoped."
✤
He takes Eito to the Library and makes him sit down. He can't remember the books Eito likes and he can't remember how the shelving system worked even though Eito explained it to him once. Those sorts of explanations don't stick well in Takumi's head. Karua always told him off for it, told him to focus better and his mom would say things like that too but it never worked even when he tried really hard. He didn't expect to need this information again when Eito had been telling it to him so he hadn't made any particular effort to remember it either. He chooses a book at random and gives it to Eito.
"Here you go," he says. Eito takes it, looking at it like he's never seen something like it before. He turns it over and looks at the back and then looks at the front again.
"Thank you," he says dutifully.
"Read it," Takumi urges, when Eito doesn't open it. "You like reading."
✤
The second time had been better but also bad. All of it felt pretty bad. Takumi tried not to think about it. Takumi didn't like thinking about it. It worked out fine in the end though and he didn't have much choice because otherwise someone else might die and they needed more manpower and they got it right in the end and now Eito's free and doesn't need to hate everything so it's better for him too.
Still, he feels badly when he thinks about it.
✤
Eito reads in silence, tucking himself into the corner of a couch in the Library. Takumi sits on the other end, leaving a solid amount of space between them. He doesn't plan on reading but he can only watch Eito read for so long before he starts to feel like a creep, so in the end he picks a book up for himself and only half pays attention to it.
✤
Eito hadn't been fearful the second time, only sad and defeated and he still spoke of Takumi as a monster and called him the usual things — ugly, vile, loathsome, despicable, repulsive and so on and so forth — but there was no heat at all behind it. Not even any hatred really and when he'd looked at him it was like looking into the total darkness of the Tokyo Residential Complex's ceiling at night, an artificial nighttime sky with no moon or stars to speak of.
What's the point though, he'd said after his litany of insults had come to an end. He raised his wrists as much as they would go against his restraints, which was less than an inch. There's no point, no point, no point. His wrists had been rubbed raw and red from the day before but it didn't seem to hurt him now, or rather he didn't notice, or rather he didn't care.
"Are you going to kill me, Takumi-kun?" he asked listlessly. "It might be better if you did. Disgusting as you are, it would be better if you did. It would be more bearable if you did. Better that than to live in this world of horrible humans." His eyelids fluttered shut and didn't open again for several dragged out painful seconds. "To die would be an awfully big adventure, wouldn't it? At least, by your hands it might be. It might be better if you did," he said again and then was quiet and would say no more.
"I think," Takumi said, throat dry and voice sort of hoarse. "I think we should try again."
✤
But it was better the third time. The third time was what they wanted, an Eito who was nice and didn't lie and didn't hate and didn't want to hurt anybody except for those he was told he should hurt. An Eito who saw people as people and didn't need to fear or hate or revile them. The third time was good and it was better and so Takumi can erase the memories of the first two times clean out of his head, or at least he tries to. They were erased out of Eito's head at least which is good because Takumi doesn't think he could bear it if Eito looked at him like that again.
He's gotten tired of being hated by him. It wears on him like rushing river wears on the rocks that lie within it, tumbling them smooth and shiny and eroding them away bit by bit.
It gets tiring after a while. It gets exhausting, to be hated by Eito and to hate him in turn. When there was hate, there was never only hate alone and when there was hate alone for a brief, furious, brillliant second it had been exsanguinated rapidly, all of his hate leeched out of him as he'd thrust his blade into his chest and tore the life and soul and blood from his body and took it into himself and made it a part of him, knitted the very fiber of Eito's being into his own so the two can never be unraveled.
Eito closes the book with a quiet thud!
"I finished," he announces, looking over at Takumi with expectant eyes.
"Oh, really?" Takumi has himself made it perhaps thirty pages into his own book and retained approximately none of it. Eito continues to stare at him. "Good job?" he offers weakly. Eito seems satisfied by that because he smiles and sets the book down on his lap, a happy look on his face. "Did you like it?"
"Oh yes," and Eito sounds more like his old self again so Takumi nods his head encouragingly, "I didn't know any of those things, you see. Or maybe I just didn't remember…?" He trails off, contemplatively, tapping his forefinger to his chin. "I think I've forgotten some things," he tells Takumi, looking as though he's just realizing it himself.
"You don't need to worry about it," Takumi replies hastily. "Some of the things you forgot were bad things, so uh, it's probably better if they stay forgotten. They make you unhappy." Eito looks down at his lap, placing his gloved hands over the cover of the book. Takumi is starting to wonder what exactly Eito read and has a thought that he perhaps should have not picked a book at total random.
"Is it bad to be unhappy?" he asks softly.
"Sometimes it is." Takumi shifts uncomfortably. "Sometimes you can't avoid it, I guess, but… it's better to avoid it if you can, right?"
"I see," says Eito seriously. "It's better then, if I don't remember some things?"
"Yeah. Yeah, it's better." He hesitates, then falters, and then flounders. "I-I mean, I don't like it when you're unhappy, that's why. So don't worry about not remembering everything, cause it's nothing good. I mean, it made you really unhappy and you're happier like this, or you seem happier."
"You're very worried about me being happy," Eito remarks thoughtfully, looking over at Takumi with gentle, warm eyes. "You're nice, Takumi-kun."
Takumi doesn't feel particularly nice but it makes him glow inside to know that Eito thinks of him that way.
"You're my friend," he tells him, "of course I'm nice to you."