[He opens the door without much expectation, already dressed down for sleep in the clothes he bought that are a surprising approximation of what he used to wear back in Tokyo; even the house slippers seemed weirdly similar to what he could pick up in Japan, but Akira's never questioned it. The colder air from outside is already curling over his toes before the door's even wedged open the entire way, and then he can't think of anything at all. Perhaps it's Eren, coming to ask him something even though Akira (at least to his knowledge) hasn't done anything worthy of a sound complaint in a month and a half.
It's his brain, freezing and stalling and failing to restart, as his eyes process first Maruki's face and then the blood that might as well be covering him from head to toe. It turns all of Maruki's words into white noise after "hurt", the denial of his own state making something in Akira's gut twist with nausea. He feels his body go rigid like it's happening to someone else, detached yet snagged into the moment like a fish hook has him by the collar.
It takes a short but impossible moment to remember to breathe. He can't stop looking at the blood, face rapidly going pale. Akira isn't sure of what kind of expression he's making.]
Ma-
[Maria, maybe, is what he's trying to say, an attempt to pull out a Salvation he doesn't have access to without her. Maruki, perhaps, with his voice pitched up on the final beat of his name like a question, seeking the answer he doesn't have the breath to ask for. Maybe not a ma entirely, but a mo, because surely Morgana would be able to fix it, make everything better and full of sense once more.
The words Akira had spoken the last time he saw him are a dagger lodged in his chest.
And when we get there, "I" will save you.
He really is the fool. There's so much blood. The moment he dares to want anything is always the moment he can never save anyone at all.]
Bathroom. Now. [Between one moment and the next, his hand has lashed out and gripped Maruki's arm as unyieldingly as an iron bar (is it even safe to touch him there, will it make it even worse-). Akira may be in the middle of a fraught rebooting process, but something in his body still remembers how to be Joker and how to respond when one of his is downed.] Where are you bleeding from?
[Akira tugs him into the apartment, trying to recollect what's in his first aid kit under the sink. He's never used it, so it should be enough, unless it's even worse than it looks...]
takes a deep breath and shuts my eyes
It's his brain, freezing and stalling and failing to restart, as his eyes process first Maruki's face and then the blood that might as well be covering him from head to toe. It turns all of Maruki's words into white noise after "hurt", the denial of his own state making something in Akira's gut twist with nausea. He feels his body go rigid like it's happening to someone else, detached yet snagged into the moment like a fish hook has him by the collar.
It takes a short but impossible moment to remember to breathe. He can't stop looking at the blood, face rapidly going pale. Akira isn't sure of what kind of expression he's making.]
Ma-
[Maria, maybe, is what he's trying to say, an attempt to pull out a Salvation he doesn't have access to without her. Maruki, perhaps, with his voice pitched up on the final beat of his name like a question, seeking the answer he doesn't have the breath to ask for. Maybe not a ma entirely, but a mo, because surely Morgana would be able to fix it, make everything better and full of sense once more.
The words Akira had spoken the last time he saw him are a dagger lodged in his chest.
And when we get there, "I" will save you.
He really is the fool. There's so much blood. The moment he dares to want anything is always the moment he can never save anyone at all.]
Bathroom. Now. [Between one moment and the next, his hand has lashed out and gripped Maruki's arm as unyieldingly as an iron bar (is it even safe to touch him there, will it make it even worse-). Akira may be in the middle of a fraught rebooting process, but something in his body still remembers how to be Joker and how to respond when one of his is downed.] Where are you bleeding from?
[Akira tugs him into the apartment, trying to recollect what's in his first aid kit under the sink. He's never used it, so it should be enough, unless it's even worse than it looks...]